Lords Sitting of 8 June 1973

Preamble
The House met at eleven of the clock: The LORD CHANCELLOR On the Woolsack.
Prayers—Read by the Lord Bishop of Hereford.

OFFICIAL REPORT (HANSARD)
11.6 a.m.
EARL ST. ALDWYN: My Lords, with the leave of the House I should like to make a statement about the OFFICIAL REPORT of to-day's proceedings. None of the 13 Hansard reporters, who are direct employees of the House, has reported for duty to-day. I would rather not go into the detail concerning the reasons for this strike; suffice to say that discussions with the staff association concerned are proceeding. I do not wish to say anything at this stage which might in any way prejudice these discussions.
So far as to-day's proceedings are concerned, we shall do the best we can with the resources at our disposal. Obviously, in the absence of verbatim reporters, the Report cannot be transcribed from shorthand notes in the usual way, but the proceedings of the House are also recorded on tape, as a back-up to the shorthand notes. To-day, therefore, we shall record the proceedings and I am hopeful that without too much delay it will be possible to produce a Hansard Report. However, I am afraid that Hansard will be delayed and may be less perfect than the standard to which we have become accustomed.
I greatly regret the inconvenience caused to the House, particularly to those who are taking part to-day, but I shall keep the House informed of any further developments.
LORD SHACKLETON: My Lords, I am frankly astonished at this statement, but, in accordance with what we have always agreed, it would be best to make no comment beyond asking that the Government and the House authorities will do their best in the matter and keep the House informed.
LORD MAYBRAY-KING: My Lords, would the noble Lord bear in mind that
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when a body of men so devoted and so loyal as the Hansard Reporters withdraw their labour for the first time in history, they must have some kind of case, and I hope that he will examine it very sympathetically.
EARL ST. ALDWYN: My Lords, I am sure that what the noble Lord has said will be borne in mind fully.

STUDENT GRANTS
11.9 a.m.
LORD BEAUMONT OF WHITLEY: My Lords, I beg leave to ask the Question which stands in my name on the Order Paper.
The Question was as follows:
To ask Her Majesty's Government how they propose to assist students over the age of eighteen whose parents refuse to pay the assessed parental contributions.
THE PARLIAMENTARY UNDERSECRETARY OF STATE, DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION AND SCIENCE (LORD SANDFORD): My Lords, my right honourable friend has no such proposals in mind. It is an essential principle in the system of grants for undergraduate and comparable courses that parents are responsible for contributing, according to their means, towards the cost of the higher education of their sons and daughters.
LORD BEAUMONT OF WHITLEY: My Lords, while thanking the Minister for that reply, is he aware that his honourable friend Mr. St. John-Stevas said on May 15:
"I undertake to do what I can to help to achieve equity in these rare but difficult cases."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, Commons, 15/5/73; col. 1221.]
Does the Minister agree that, without breaking the very good principle that there should be grants rather than loans, in these cases it would be suitable to set up a loan machinery; and will he undertake to put that to the Secretary of State?
LORD SANDFORD: My Lords, I note the suggestion in the noble Lord's supplementary question, but, as he will know, the effect of introducing a loan system would benefit the better-off parents rather

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than those with whom we should be concerned chiefly, the less well off, and who have been helped by adjustments in the scale of parental contributions.
LORD GARNSWORTHY: My Lords, is the noble Lord aware that it is the student who suffers when the parent refuses to help? I gathered from his first reply that the Government have nothing in mind to ease the situation. May I ask the noble Lord whether he will request his right honourable friend to give very serious thought to an extremely unsatisfactory situation that penalises young people who cannot help themselves.
LORD SANDFORD: My Lords, as the noble Lord will know, we have taken a number of steps as recently as May 15 to increase student grants. Other steps are coming into force at the beginning of the next academic year to reduce the point at which parental contributions are to begin. That is to deal with the real problems of parents with low incomes. My answer to the question on parents who refuse to make contributions remains as in my original Answer.
LORD LEATHERLAND: My Lords, may I ask the noble Lord—and I do so as the treasurer of a university; an unpaid post, of course—whether he will forget completely the suggestion that a loan scheme should be introduced. Furthermore, will he arrange for some radical adjustment to be made to the means test whereby the parental contributions are now demanded? I rather gathered that something of that kind was in his mind.
LORD SANDFORD: My Lords, yes, I will take note of that point.
LORD DAVIES OF LEEK: My Lords, nevertheless, and thanking the noble Lord for his reply, is he aware that sometimes within a family there is a difference of opinion—I saw it once in my lifetime—that could be tragic for a young, ambitious student who gets to university; one parent desiring wholeheartedly the young student to do the university course, and sometimes the father objecting and saying that the lad should be going to work. There is then the problem that, no matter what grants are available, the father himself would not agree. Consequently, the original suggestion of the
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noble Lord, Lord Beaumont, is to my mind worth while because in my own day, under the Glamorgan County Council, we had no grants such as one has to-day; we had to pay them back when we had earning power.
LORD SANDFORD: My Lords, those of us who are fathers are fully aware of what the noble Lord has been saying, but I think, as Members of Parliament, that we are also aware that hard cases make very bad law.
BARONESS GAITSKELL: My Lords, may I ask the noble Lord how prevalent this thing is—personally I have never heard of such cases before—and whether it is at all widespread. If it is widespread, then it really needs looking into.
LORD SANDFORD: My Lords, I am grateful for what the noble Baroness has said, because although it would be idle to deny that there are no cases of this kind, the cases of the parents of low income are much more important.
LORD GARNSWORTHY: My Lords, as the noble Lord appreciates, in the case of the relatively few students whose parents refuse to help, this is not a matter of bad law. This strikes me—and I would ask the noble Lord to consider it—as constituting a grave injustice so far as the young person is concerned.
LORD SANDFORD: My Lords, that may be so, but it does not justify intruding the law into domestic and family affairs.
LORD SEGAL: My Lords, could not the noble Lord consider, even if the problem is not widespread, making these loans available, even on a temporary basis, in cases of genuine hardship so that the careers of the students may not suffer?
LORD SANDFORD: My Lords, the question of loans has been looked into before. I will draw the attention of my right honourable friend to the point the noble Lord has made, but my advice at the moment is that the effect of introducing loans would be to benefit the better-off parents and not those worse off.
LORD WYNNE-JONES: My Lords, would the noble Lord bear in mind, in considering this matter, that we have a very small percentage of the children of

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manual workers who go to the university? Very frequently they are unable to go because of the hardship thrown on their parents, who nowadays frequently come within the range of having to make a contribution. Would he bear this in mind, and would he also remember that the students mentioned in this Question are of age, and therefore ought to have the right to decide for themselves whether they go to university, not at the whim of their parents?
LORD SANDFORD: My Lords, I bear in mind what the noble Lord has said about the hardship involved in the case of parents on low incomes, but that is quite a different case from the parents who refuse to pay the contribution. There is no evidence that manual workers are more likely to refuse to pay their contribution than any other kind of parent.
LORD CHORLEY: My Lords, is the noble Lord aware that in some university institutions there are arrangements for making loans from the institution itself to the student who is in difficulties? There certainly were in my time. I wonder whether any real survey of this has been made.
LORD SANDFORD: My Lords, as the noble Lord will know, there is the question of loans to postgraduate students, which is being looked into at the moment. Perhaps that is what he has in mind.
LORD CHORLEY: My Lords, I am referring to undergraduate students. One of the most distinguished professors in England was helped in this way, and he repaid it all within quite a short time when he had a job.
LORD BEAUMONT OF WHITLEY: My Lords, I think this is most unsatisfactory. Is the Minister aware that his answer about not intervening in family affairs really does not apply when the children are over 18—the age of majority? Is he aware that his answer that it would benefit the better-off parents is completely untrue, since if the parents are refusing it will not benefit the parents at all but will benefit only the students? Will he, in view of the number of points which have been made, please press this on his right honourable friend with the utmost urgency?

FIREARMS CONTROL
LORD COTTESLOE: My Lords, I beg leave to ask the Question which stands in my name on the Order Paper.
The Question was as follows:
To ask Her Majesty's Government for an assurance that opportunity will be given for both Houses of Parliament to discuss the Consultative Document on the Control of Firearms (Cmnd. 5297) before any legislation on the subject is brought forward.
THE MINISTER OF STATE, HOME OFFICE (VISCOUNT COLVILLE OF CULROSS): My Lords, I cannot of course speak for another place, but so far as this House is concerned I understand that my noble friends the Leader of the House and the Chief Whip will be prepared to make time available for a debate on the Green Paper before legislation is introduced.
LORD COTTESLOE: My Lords, while thanking my noble friend for that encouraging reply, may I ask him whether he is aware—I think he is, but I have to put it in the form of a question—that the matters raised in the Green Paper are of great complexity, with many facets, and of great concern to several hundreds of thousands of citizens who use firearms for wholly legitimate purposes? Will he press upon his right hon. friend the essential importance of having the matters raised in the Green Paper fully discussed before any question, even of drafting legislation, let alone of bringing it before Parliament, arises?
VISCOUNT COLVILLE OF CULROSS: My Lords, yes; I know that this matter has caused a great deal of concern to people who quite properly and legitimately hold and use firearms.
The equal problem, of course, is that of those who illegitimately use firearms, and this is not a matter that any Government can take lightly. That is why some of the things proposed may look a bit stringent.
We have already asked for comments; we have asked for them urgently. If noble Lords would like to tell us provisionally what comments they would like to make, naturally we should be glad to receive them. I fully understand

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the sort of points my noble friend has made, and I hope that we can discuss them in a debate. If he wishes to raise some of them even before that, he is very welcome to do so.
BARONESS GAITSKELL: My Lords, would the noble Lord agree that however much the concern caused by this Green Paper—and the suggestion that the noble Lord, Lord Cottesloe, has made—to people who legitimately use firearms, the concern is much greater to those people who do not have firearms and who suffer when people use firearms in the wrong way?
VISCOUNT COLVILLE OF CULROSS: My Lords, yes, that is exactly the other side of the case. This is the one that particularly worries the Government, although of course we do not want to prejudice a properly controlled legitimate use of firearms.
LORD SWANSEA: My Lords, is my noble friend aware that the shooting interests as a whole are very appreciative of the Government's consideration in putting forward their proposals in this form? At the same time, is he aware that the time limit set for representations to be sent in does not allow enough time for interested organisations to collect the comments of their members and to discuss the proposals fully within their own ruling bodies? So will Her Majesty's Government allow an extension of time for the reception of comments on these proposals?
VISCOUNT COLVILLE OF CULROSS: My Lords, I think I ought to say this to my noble friend. I know that time is short, but it is an urgent problem, as the noble Baroness, Lady Gaitskell, has pointed out. A time limit is laid down. I should have thought that the responsible sort of bodies about which my noble friend has spoken would have agreed that this needs urgent consideration and would have done everything they could to consult their various colleagues, and so on, about it in time. If they cannot do this, we shall not resist the reception of comments later; but, clearly, the sooner they are received, the more likely they are to be listened to.

HOVERCRAFT ACCIDENT INQUIRY
11.22 a.m.
THE EARL OF KINNOULL: My Lords, I beg leave to ask the Question which stands in my name on the Order Paper.
The Question was as follows:
To ask Her Majesty's Government whether the findings of the inquiry into the SRN.6 accident have led to any modification of the vehicle.
THE MINISTER WITHOUT PORTFOLIO (LORD DRUMALBYN): My Lords, the findings of the inquiry into the SRN.6 hovercraft accident were largely connected with operational matters, remedial action on which has been taken. It is the view of the Civil Aviation Authority, which has the responsibility for certifying the intrinsic safety of hovercraft, that the SRN.6, as at present designed and constructed, is safe when operated within the operational conditions imposed. The desirability of introducing certain constructional modifications to the craft which were recommended in the report on the accident is under consideration by the Civil Aviation Authority. One modification which might enable craft to operate safely in worse environmental conditions is currently being tested, and a decision will be taken as soon as possible.
THE EARL OF KINNOULL: My Lords, I am grateful to my noble friend for that reply. In view of the technical reasons for the inquiry not being held in public, and of the seriousness of the accident in which six people lost their lives, may I ask my noble friend whether the Minister will consider publishing the report arising out of that inquiry, in order to reassure the confidence in hovercraft travel? Would he confirm also that future hovercraft accidents would be the subject of public inquiry, along much the same procedures as any rail or air accident?
LORD DRUMALBYN: My Lords, since June 2, 1972, inquiries of this type will be conducted along the lines of the Merchant Shipping Act inquiries. The inquiry which took place in this case was in the nature of a preliminary inquiry; it is not the practice to publish preliminary inquiries.
LORD HARVEY OF PRESTBURY: My Lords, could my noble friend say when the modifications will be carried out, bearing in mind that tens of thousands of passengers travel in these craft, and that it affects the export trade? Could we have a real assurance about the future?
LORD DRUMALBYN: My Lords, as I said in my Answer, the Civil Aviation Authority is satisfied that the present design of hovercraft is safe, when operated within the operational conditions imposed. Mandatory upper wind and sea limits in which the craft may operate were prescribed in operating permits issued under new legislation, which came into force in June, 1972.
LORD HARVEY OF PRESTBURY: My Lords, my noble friend said that modifications would be carried out at a future date. Could he say when they will be carried out?
LORD DRUMALBYN: My Lords, I did not say that. I said that one modification which might enable the craft to operate safely in worse environmental conditions than the operational conditions which are imposed now is being tested currently, and a decision will be taken as soon as possible.
LORD BURNTWOOD: My Lords, with regard to the matter of operational services of this particular form of transport, has he any figures to show what percentage of services have had to be cancelled due to conditions being considered unsuitable?
LORD DRUMALBYN: My Lords, I do not have that information, but I will write to my noble friend.
LORD SHACKLETON: My Lords, I am not quite clear from the noble Lord whether the results of the inquiry have been published, even though the whole inquiry has not, nor how far he is giving us information, thanks to the initiative of the noble Earl. In these circumstances, would he consider whether, if, for reasons which seem appropriate to the Government, the actual report—or the details—of the inquiry are not published, there should be some sort of authoritative statement? I suspect we are all rather left up in the air, appreciating that a new procedure will apply in future.
LORD DRUMALBYN: My Lords, when my noble friend last asked a question on this subject, I said that a statement would be made before last Christmas. In fact, it was made on December 20—not in this House, because the House was not sitting on that day. It is published in the House of Commons Hansard for December 20, 1972.

CLYDE NAVIGATION AND LARGE ORE CARRIERS
11.26 a.m.
THE EARL OF GLASGOW: My Lords, I beg leave to ask the Question which stands in my name on the Order Paper.
The Question was as follows:
To ask Her Majesty's Government whether, in view of the proposals to introduce very large ore carriers, and possibly oil tankers, into the channel between the Cumbraes and the Hunterston-Portencross peninsular in the Firth of Clyde and the dangers inherent in so doing, they can say whether a detailed survey of the sea areas involved has been carried out; and, if so, what were its findings.
LORD DRUMALBYN: My Lords, I understand that the Clyde Port Authority have recently carried out check surveys in the area which reveal no significant differences from the depths marked on current Admiralty charts.
THE EARL OF GLASGOW: My Lords, while thanking my noble friend for that not entirely satisfactory reply, may I ask: is he aware that there is a large number of retired sea captains who live in the area, some of them having had experience of handling these extremely large ships? Everyone to whom I have spoken regards this project with great alarm and despondency, particularly in view of the proximity of the nuclear power station.
LORD DRUMALBYN: My Lords, I am not aware of what my noble friend has said, but I have no doubt that it is true. My noble friend has asked whether a detailed survey has been carried out. This has been done in a particular area, and is the basis of the statement which I have made to-day.
THE EARL OF LAUDERDALE: My Lords, would my noble friend say

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whether, if there is a prospect of marine hazard at Portencross, there might not be fresh consideration given to Ardrossan as a terminal? Have the marine implications of that, in regard to the sea-bed, been studied equally carefully?
LORD DRUMALBYN: My Lords, the width of the channel here is greater than that which goes up to Loch Finart. In that loch, large tankers can turn round already. There is no reason to believe that the conditions between the Cum-braes and Ayrshire would be any worse—indeed, it is expected that they would be better than that.
THE EARL OF LAUDERDALE: My Lords, is it not a matter to some extent, of cross winds and the movements of tides, and so on, which need to be examined, and not simply of depth and width of channel?
LORD DRUMALBYN: My Lords, I will certainly look into that further. I am sure that my noble friend knows from experience—And I would have thought—that the conditions in Loch Finart are very much worse.
LORD SHACKLETON: My Lords, in the Hansard report of this, would it be possible for the word "peninsula" to be spelt correctly as a noun, instead of in the adjectival form? This is not the Government's responsibility, but perhaps it is a matter which the Deputy Leader of the House could clarify.
THE EARL OF GLASGOW: My Lords, I should like to ask my noble friend two supplementary questions. First, does he think that, in developing this industry at Hunterston, we are taking on too many calculated risks? Apart from the navigational hazards, there is the proximity of the nuclear power station, and the danger of a south-westerly gale coinciding with a high spring tide on the land which it is proposed to reclaim. On top of this, of course, we are losing some of the best agricultural land in the West of Scotland. Secondly, even if all these difficulties were overcome, does my noble friend think that the industry which could be amassed at Hunterston would have a sufficient impact on the Scottish economy to be worth ruining for all time one of the most beautiful coasts in the kingdom?
LORD DRUMALBYN: My Lords, the considerations to which my noble friend has referred are extremely important, and are being borne in mind by my right honourable friend the Secretary of State for Scotland. My right honourable friend published a guidance to interested parties—parties interested in development, that is—on May 31, 1937. So far as the first part of the question is concerned, when firm development proposals are made, then the whole matter of safety for deep draught vessels, and how deep, will have to be looked into.
LORD WYNNE-JONES: My Lords, if the noble Lord finds that there are problems in the Clyde which make it risky to have these large ore carriers there, would Her Majesty's Government consider using South Wales instead—perhaps Pembrokeshire—for these carriers, so that South Wales could have the benefit?
LORD DRUMALBYN: My Lords, if the Government were to find that, no doubt this would be considered; but the Government have been proceeding on the basis that this particular channel is available for deep-draught vessels. There is no reason to suppose that this is not so. So far as the answer I have already given is concerned, I think it will be clear what steps the Government propose to take.
THE EARL OF GLASGOW: My Lords, I am sure my noble friend is aware that there are alternative sites in Scotland.
LORD DRUMALBYN: My Lords, there are alternative sites in Scotland, but the Clyde has a very great reputation as an internationally famous port, and it has always been recognised that this site offers great potentialities.
LORD WIGG: My Lords, as the House is without the services of the Hansard Reporters, would the Government undertake to look into the sense of grievance which has caused these excellent servants of the House to withdraw their labour, and to see that their conditions of service and their rates of pay are—
EARL ST. ALDWYN: My Lords, I really do think the noble Lord is out of order. I made a statement earlier on. If he had wished to make a comment he should have made it then. We are now dealing with a Starred Question and about to move on to other business. I think he is out of order.
LORD WIGG: My Lords, I regret that I am not aware of any rule of order which prevents my saying what I want to say. All I am asking is that the rates of pay should be looked at.
THE MINISTER OF STATE, DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH AND SOCIAL SECURITY (LORD ABERDARE): My Lords, I think the noble Lord is completely out of order. This matter is not on the order paper, and therefore he is speaking completely out of turn. My noble friend has already made a statement on this matter, and the noble Lord did not make his comment then.

SOUTHAMPTON CORPORATION BILL
11.34 a.m.
THE CHAIRMAN OF COMMITTEES (THE EARL OF LISTOWEL): My Lords, I beg to move that this Bill be now read a second time.
Moved, That the Bill be now read 2a.—(The Earl of Listowel.)
LORD NUGENT OF GUILDFORD: My Lords, may I make a brief intervention on the Southampton Corporation Bill? First, let me say that 'lave no objection to the general purpose of the Bill, which I understand and sympathise with, but I wish to draw attention to a feature in Clause 15 of the Bill, which provides for the taking of tolls for the new bridge over the Itchen. That is the general purpose of the Bill. Subsection (2) of Clause 5 would give the Corporation power, among other things, to fix tolls having regard to
"the need to control the composition and flow of the traffic over the bridge so as to avoid causing traffic congestion in areas adjacent to the bridge and so as to preserve the character and amenities of those areas."
I want to call attention to this provision because it is one which is unprecedented in our Statute Law. It contains an innovation in traffic control policy; that is to say, it introduces, for the first time, a policy of road pricing in order to restrain traffic. This is, of course, a matter of major importance. I consider that a debate on a Private Bill is not the occasion to argue the merits of such a change of policy, but I think it is sufficient to say that it is
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a matter of great public interest. Most of the adult population to-day either own cars or ride in them at one time or another; therefore there are very cogent arguments both in favour of such a policy and against it. So far as I am concerned, with some slight acquaintance with traffic engineering, I shall say no more than that I am neutral on the merits.
But the purpose of my intervention, my Lords, is solely on the constitutional point that major changes of national policy should not be introduced in a Private Bill, for the following reasons. First, if they are introduced in this way they deprive Parliament of the proper opportunity to debate the merits of the change and take a considered view and decision which Parliament could do on a Public Bill. Secondly, whatever the merits in a particular Private Bill, as in this one, such a provision creates a precedent which never fails to be embarrassing when it is repeated in some other less suitable Private Bill later on. It is always very difficult to argue against the precedent. I therefore suggest that this argument outweighs any argument which might be advanced in favour of justifying this as an experiment which might help in the evolution of public policy.
The right way, I am sure, is for the Secretary of State for the Environment to introduce a Public Bill, with whatever safeguards he thinks necessary, so that it can be applied in certain places and tried out as he thinks best, with all necessary safeguards. Let me say, finally, that I acknowledge that in another place an Amendment was put into Clause 15 which strengthens the Secretary of State's powers to control the fixing of tolls, but, in my opinion, this does not relieve the Bill of the Constitutional defect to which I have referred. I would therefore ask that when the Select Committee comes to consider this Bill, it will give careful thought to remedying the defect to which I am calling attention.
11.38 a.m.
LORD JACQUES: My Lords, first may I thank the noble Lord Nugent for his characteristic courtesy in advising me of the line he was going to take. I have, of course, reciprocated. I would also say that I have had no contact with the

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Southampton Corporation or with the motoring associations who have petitioned. I am speaking on behalf of my colleagues on this side of the House. I would also remind the House that what is being considered is not the question of whether there should be tolls. In fact, in paragraph 9 the Petitioners say:
"In all the circumstances of this case, your petitioners do not object to tolls being the means of paying for the construction and maintenance of this particular bridge."
So that is not the issue. The issue is whether or not there should be differential tolls.
The clause in the Bill provides that
"the Corporation shall have regard to—
first, the financial position and future prospects of the bridge scheme;
secondly, the need to control the composition and flow of traffic over the bridge so as to avoid causing traffic congestion in areas adjacent to the bridge and so as to preserve the character and amenities of those areas; and
thirdly, the question of whether to allow any class of traffic to use the bridge without payment of tolls or on payment of tolls at a reduced rate—

(a) where the grant of any such concession would assist the disabled or aged;

(b) where, in the opinion of the Corporation, the grant of any such concession for a limited period would be desirable in the interests of assisting the establishment of industry or commerce in the city;

(c) where the traffic is of a local character."

We, on this side of the House, feel that this issue could be decided only when the case has been presented in detail by counsel on both sides. The Committee in another place has heard those arguments on both sides, and the Bill has come through with only the slight amendment to which reference has been made. We should like this Bill to ao to the Committee of this House in such a way that the Committee would feel completely uninhibited and would he free to hear the arguments put by both sides. Furthermore. in our view we should not reverse the decision of the Committee of the other place unless there is very strong reason.
11.41 a.m.
LORD LUCAS OF CHILWORTH: My Lords, I should not like to go against anything my noble friend Lord Nugent has said. I must declare an interest in
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that I have discussed the Bill and its proposals with the officials in my home city. We regard this as essentially a local matter. It is a means to an end, to service a local requirement. The method by which we are to control the use of the bridge is fiscal. It may be a little different, but to local people for whom the service is being provided there is very little difference, in that they already pay to cross the river in motor vehicles. Foot passengers do not pay and are not required to pay under the proposals in the Bill. If there is an element of innovation it is a very minor element and one which essentially concerns those people for whom an amenity problem has arisen over 70 years. This is the culmination of planning. The bridge and the way it is to be used is part of the draft structure plan. The method of controlling traffic is unique and has certain advantages for the local people for whom the service is designed. When the Bill goes before a Committee in your Lordships' House I hope that the Committee will view the Bill and its proposals in that light and not in the light of its being some instrument of great national import from which other people may claim a precedent.
11.43 a.m.
LORD MAYBRAY-KING: My Lords, as one who is somewhat in loco parentis to the Bill, I thought it would be fairer to the House if I allowed other noble Lords to speak before I tried to answer any points which arose in the debate. I have for the past 50 years lived in Southampton with the problem connected with this bridge and with the Bill. I am grateful to my noble friend Lord Nugent for indicating that he has no desire to divide the House on Second Reading and that he is not opposed to the Bill as such. That was evident in the Committee stage in the other place, when people were discussing their anxieties and reservations about the Bill. The noble Lord Lord Nugent speaks as President of the R.A.C.—
LORD NUGENT OF GUILDFORD: My Lords, would the noble Lord allow me to point out that I am not President of the R.A.C., but I should have told the House that I have an interest, in that I am on the Committee of the R.A.C.
LORD MAYBRAY-KING: We are both members of the R.A.C., myself a much more humble one. Lord Nugent's point of view was carefully put by representatives of the R.A.C. and the A.A. during the Committee stage in the other place. As a result of the doubts so clearly expressed this morning by Lord Nugent, that Committee reversed the priorities which it had attached to the toll charges, making the first priority of the toll charges to meet the cost of the bridge. I think that amendment made by the Committee was the right one. The Committee also wrote into the Bill an Amendment giving the Secretary of State real control over any toll charges. Any attempt at what is called price fixing is controlled by road pricing in the Bill.
I would emphasise that there is no Government grant towards the financing of this new bridge. When I came to Southampton over 50 years ago there was a floating bridge connecting part of Southampton with the new part, under the Itchen Urban District Council, which had been taken over. It was a private bridge, charging tolls. There were campaigns for 30 to 40 years, in which I took an active part, to free the floating bridge, which was finally achieved in 1948. But Southampton wanted a real bridge connecting the rapidly developing Itchen district of Southampton with Southampton itself. After the war there were campaigns, in which I again took part, both by the Council and by the Members of Parliament, to have a new bridge built across the Itchen. The first bridge that was planned was a wide bridge, part of a vast scheme of road planning in southern Hampshire. It became unimportant from that point of view when the M.27 was built and the whole conception of road strategy in southern Hampshire was changed. That bridge, which was to be a dual carriageway, was to be 75 per cent. financed by the Government. The bridge we are dealing with in the Bill is a narrower bridge and it will be financed by the local authority. Its main purpose—and to the citizens of Southampton practically its only purpose—is to connect Southampton with a vastly expanded new Itchen area.
It is clear from the Report of the Committee in the other place that none of the representations on this point was
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made by anyone opposed to having such a bridge. All recognised the need for it. All recognised the need for a toll. The main doubts were expressed this morning by the noble Lord. The Corporation feels that whilst the main purpose of raising tolls is to finance the cost of the bridge, it still wants the power to introduce some kind of differential toll if it becomes necessary to control some of the heavy traffic going over a bridge which is primarily concerned with servicing the people of Southampton. I am asked by the Corporation to say that it may well be that road pricing should be the subject of public debate and public legislation in due course. Whatever the position nationally, the lack of a bridge across the Itchen south of Northern Bridge is a special local problem. When it is built, the existence of such a bridge might also cause another local problem to which I referred. The Corporation is firmly of the view that if there is no restraint on the traffic using the bridge, other than the restraint of uncontrolled congestion, the bridge should not be built. The problem is one peculiar to Southampton, and therefore the Corporation has no desire to set a national precedent.
My Lords, when I went across the first free floating bridge in 1948, those of us who are forward-looking in Southampton were already looking to a free bridge. This is the first step towards ultimately a free bridge. This one is to be built within four years. I hope I am not too optimistic about my chance of survival when I say that I look forward to the day when I shall walk across, not a toll bridge but a free bridge over the Itchen. I commend the Bill to your Lordships. I am certain the Committee will take note of what the noble Lord, Lord Nugent has said. I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Jacques, and the noble Lord, Lord Lucas, for their help this morning.
THE EARL OF LISTOWEL: My Lords, I am obliged to all the noble Lords who have spoken for their comments on the Bill. I shall draw the attention of the promoters to what has been said. If your Lordships give the Bill a Second Reading, as a Petition has been deposited against it it will be referred to a Select Committee. I can assure the noble Lord, Lord Nugent of Guildford, and all the other noble Lords, that the record of what

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they have said will also be made available to members of the Select Committee.
On Question, Bill read 2a, and committed to a Select Committee.

BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE
11.51 a.m.
EARL ST. ALDWYN: My Lords, on behalf of my noble friend the Leader of the House, I beg to move the Motion standing in his name on the Order Paper.
Moved, That Standing Order No. 44 (No two stages of a Bill to be taken on one day) be dispensed with on Tuesday next for the purpose of taking the Bahamas Independence Bill through its remaining stages on that day.—(Earl St. Aldwyn.)
LORD BELHAVEN AND STENTON: My Lords, I apologise to the noble and learned Lord for interrupting him. May I ask the indulgence of the House for two minutes to enter a protest about this Motion? We had the Second Reading of the Bahamas Independence Bill yesterday. The main provisions were not disputed, but nobody who attended that debate could say that it was entirely uncontroversial. I have three Amendments for the Commitee stage, and with the Second Reading yesterday and the Committee stage on Tuesday it seems to me that your Lordships are not being given a fair chance to study the Amendments or to make up your minds on them.
It also seems a little uncomplimentary to the judgment and impartiality of your Lordships that it should be assumed that, should I divide the House on the Committee stage, the Government will automatically win. Moreover, a number of Her Majesty's subjects are very concerned about the Bill, and the way in which it is going through the House will seem to them to savour of rather unseemly haste.
LORD SHEPHERD: My Lords, in normal circumstances I would have given sympathetic support to the noble Lord, Lord Belhaven, first of all perhaps on the speed at which the Committee stage is being taken, and also on the addition to the Motion for the Report stage and
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Third Reading to be taken immediately following the Committee stage. I think the House would be right to support the noble Lord, as we must always be jealous not only of our rights but also, when we are passing legislation, of how it affects the people directly concerned. But I would advise the House not to support the noble Lord if he should object to the Motion by calling a Division, for these two reasons.
First, an Independence Bill is a consequence of a Constitutional Conference, where the parties concerned have worked together and have produced an agreed solution. When a Bill is introduced granting independence, it has to be again subject to consultation between, in this case, the authorities in the Bahamas and our own Department. This means that time becomes very short for the passage of a Bill, particularly taking into account the independence date which has been settled in the Bahamas. So the Government may be acquitted of rushing the Bill through Parliament.
In regard to the Amendments, they were moved and fully debated in another place. They had one simple purpose; there was nothing very involved in them. The reports in the newspapers and in Hansard will clearly give to Members of your Lordships' House the substance and the problems that are involved. Therefore while, in normal circumstances, I should have supported the noble Lord, I think that this is an occasion when I could not do so; and I think that the Government ought to be permitted to get the Bill through as quickly as possible, so that the arrangements in the Bahamas, which are quite involved, can be proceeded with.
There is one other factor. Though the Bill grants independence, the Constitution can come into force in the Bahamas only when the Order in Council is presented to Her Majesty, and that, of course, cannot be done until the Bill has been passed. I sympathise with the noble Lord, Lord Belhaven, but on this occasion I have to advise the House not to support him.
LORD COLERAINE: My Lords, it seemed to me, listening to him, that the noble Lord, Lord Shepherd, enunciated a rather novel constitutional doctrine. It was, unless I misunderstood it, that if an Independence Bill is agreed between

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Her Majesty's Government and the people of the Colony concerned, it is thereby removed from the detailed scrutiny of Parliament.
LORD SHEPHERD LORD SHEPHERD: No.
LORD COLERAINE: If he did not say that, I am not at all clear what his opening comments were. I support my noble friend Lord Belhaven. It is surely, to put it no more strongly, most extraordinary that a Motion of this kind should be put on the Order Paper and debated in the same day. I wonder whether my noble friend could give me any precedent for that, except in the case of some grave national emergency. I do not think that anyone could say that the Bill constituted that.
It is true that if we followed the advice given us by my noble friend Lord Belhaven, it would put the usual channels in both Houses to a certain amount of inconvenience, but that is something to which they are accustomed, and which I am sure they could face with equanimity. But I cannot really believe that this is an emergency of the kind that demands such treatment.
My noble friend Lady Tweedsmuir of Belhelvie yesterday developed the point touched upon by the noble Lord, Lord Shepherd, about the timetable. There are four weeks between next Tuesday and July 10, and it would surely be possible to find Parliamentary time for some discussion of the detail of the Bill. It would be out of order for me to go into the merits of the Bill, but it is surely especially important that Parliament should be careful of the rights of minorities, even of small minorities; and it is the rights of minorities that are at issue in the Bill.
Another question I must ask my noble friend is this. Why has this procedure had to be adopted? It would have been perfectly easy to put down the Motion a week ago or a month ago, or at any time in the past. Why did it have to be rushed in this way? I can think of only two alternatives: sheer incompetence of the Government officials concerned, or a deliberate attempt on the part of my noble friend to stifle discussion. I prefer the first alternative, but I should like to know which is right. It seems that, as my noble friend Lord
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Belhaven said, it is a little unfair that Amendments should be put down to-day for debate on Tuesday.
My noble friend the Minister of State yesterday accused my noble friend Lord Belhaven of being slow on the trigger. She said that he ought to have had his Amendments ready for the Second Reading debate and to have put them down the moment the debate was over. That would seem to me to imply another kind of disregard for the rights of this House. The offence that my noble friend the Minister was really accusing my noble friend Lord Belhaven of was simply that of having an open mind and of waiting to hear the debate before deciding what course he would pursue. I am sure that matters will take their course. I regret very much that this procedure has been followed and I should be obliged if my noble friend would answer the questions which I have put to him.
LORD BROCKWAY: My Lords, I should like to express appreciation to the noble Lord, Lord Belhaven, for raising this issue because, over a long period of Parliamentary experience in another place as well as here I have always stood for the right of Members of Parliament to resist efforts by Governments to press through legislation without a full opportunity for discussion. Nevertheless, I now ask him to reconsider his proposal. I do so for two reasons: first, the major issue in the Amendments to the Bill was very fully discussed yesterday on Second Reading and the noble Lord had the opportunity then to put forward his views persuasively and in detail. If there is now a suggestion from some Members of this House that we need more time to discuss this issue, my regret is that they were not present yesterday. when, after a very full discussion. the Second Reading was carried.
I must not discuss the merits of the Bill, but I would say to my noble friend that I think it became clear during the discussion yesterday that the case which he was putting had been much modified by subsequent events. I should have hoped that, on the major Amendment which was the real issue before the Committee stage, it would now be possible to come to a conclusion without a second exhaustive debate. In view of the circumstances, it seems reasonable—and I have

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tried always to be reasonable in arguing with the noble Lord on this matter—to ask the noble Lord to withdraw his suggestion.
LORD DE CLIFFORD: My Lords, I must support my noble friend Lord Belhaven. I am not really in agreement with the propositions that he is putting forward, but under the procedure that is here being invoked we may in future find ourselves in grave difficulties. This Motion was put on the Order Paper for the first time to-day and is now being debated. When we come to the Committee stage the noble Lord will put down his Amendments, which we shall discuss. The noble Lord might well, at the end of this discussion, on the assumption that your Lordships reject his proposals, feel that he, by some stroke, might produce another form of Amendment which might meet the wishes of the House.
If we then go to Report stage, the noble Lord will be entitled to submit a manuscript Amendment, but, if he does so, he will be in some difficulty because he will have only the time while the Chairman is moving from his seat to the Woolsack to draft it in two copies. If he wishes to put down an Amendment for Third Reading, under Standing Orders he must give 24 hours' notice, which is impossible; so his sole remaining possibility would be to move the Adjournment of the House. I am not suggesting that my noble friend should do such a thing, but when one embarks on proceedings such as those upon which the Government have now embarked, there may come a time when some disagreeably disposed noble Lord will indeed wreck the proceedings of the House by using the rules of procedure as a weapon. I feel, therefore, that while the noble Lord must accept the present situation, the House should be very careful before it repeats the procedure.
12.6 p.m.
EARL ST. ALDWYN: My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Shepherd, for what he has said on behalf of the Opposition, and I listened with interest to what my noble friends Lord Coleraine and Lord de Clifford and the noble Lord Lord Brockway have said. I had to look at this from a
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slightly different point of view than I think has been taken by a number of noble Lords. There has been an assumption that this House would automatically defeat any Amendments that were tabled. This is an assumption that I have no right whatever to make. It is my duty to see that there is opportunity for Amendments to be moved in this House and, if carried, to be considered in another place in due course.
As the noble Lord Lord Shepherd has said, plans are well ahead for the celebration of Independence, and if they are to be adhered to the Bill must receive the Royal Assent by the 16th of this month, which is next Saturday. Therefore, if my noble friend Lord Belhaven moves his Amendments on Tuesday, and carries them, it is essential that we should be able to complete all stages of the Bill that day so that it can go back to the other place to be considered by them and, if they disagree with my noble friend's Amendments, be returned to us so as to receive the Royal Assent by next Friday.
That is the reason for this Motion. The last thing I would do is to try to deprive your Lordships of any of your constitutional rights and it seemed to me that it was more important to ensure that, if Amendments were carried, they had proper time for consideration in another place, than to delay the stages of the Bill.
LORD SHACKLETON: My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Belhaven, has of course no right to speak again, but it would be helpful to know whether he intends to divide the House.
LORD BELHAVEN AND STENTON: My Lords, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Shackleton. I have made a protest. I should like to thank the noble Lords who have supported me, and others, who have spoken very fairly. I do not wish to press the matter to a Division.
LORD SHACKLETON: My Lords, I should just like to say that what is being done is entirely in accordance with the practice of the House. Clearly, if any sizeable number of Peers object to the procedure that the Government have put forward, we could not go through with this; but the reasons for getting, this moving are, as we understand them, compelling. It is for the House to judge

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whether they are sufficiently compelling. I think the message is that there are good reasons, but I ought to make the point to the noble Lord that it is perfectly possible at various stages not to proceed, even if we pass this Motion. It would be possible to vote against the Motion that the Report be received, or to suspend Standing Order No. 46 to allow manuscript Amendments on Third Reading. Although this is clearly undesirable if there is a very large or even a small group of Peers who find this unsatisfactory, they have so far failed to convince me that the arguments in favour of delay are stronger than those in favour of going on. It is, after all, perfectly possible for the noble Lord to get his Amendments down to-day, to have them discussed in Committee—or, rather, he has them down already—and I do not believe that it would have been appropriate (and this is a matter which might be considered) to put this Motion on the Order Paper before we had had the Second Reading. We get into these difficulties, and it is a matter for the House to judge. But, if there had been going to be a Division, the balance of argument would have led me to support the Government, because the noble Lords still retain their right at various stages to try to persuade the House to take certain action.
LORD COLERAINE: My Lords, I should like to know if the noble Lord said that this was a perfectly normal procedure.
LORD SHACKLETON: My Lords, I did. It is a procedure that I have known and used on a number of occasions. The Government usually consult the Opposition, but they are well aware that the usual channels cannot represent the whole House and they have to make the best judgment they can. The noble Lords are perfectly entitled to object to what is proposed and, if they think it so serious, to vote against it. However, I doubt whether they have persuaded the House that this is desirable.
VISCOUNT AMORY: My Lords, the critical date is that which has been announced for the Independence celebrations. It seems that this has been somewhat rushed. To have a Committee stage three days after the Second Reading is not, in general, a satisfactory plan, but I
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should have thought that in this case, bearing in mind what the noble Lord has said about my noble friend's right to have his Amendments fully debated, it would be rather unfortunate if the announced date of the celebration had to be postponed because we could not fulfill our task here.
On Question, Motion agreed to.

PROTECTION OF WRECKS BILL
12.14 p.m.
THE EARL OF CORK AND ORRERY: My Lords, I beg to move that the House do now resolve itself into Committee on this Bill.
Moved, that the House do now resolve itself into Committee.—(The Earl of Cork and Orrery.)
On Question, Motion agreed to.
House in Committee accordingly.
[The LORD ALPORT in the Chair.]
Clause 1 [Protection of sites of historic wrecks:]
THE EARL OF CORK AND ORRERY THE EARL OF CORK AND ORRERY moved Amendment No. 1:
Page 2, line 11, after ("diving") insert ("dredging").
The noble Lord said: This Amendment refers to Clause 1(3), which is the subsection that creates and lists offences which may be taken after a restricted area round a wreck has been declared by the Secretary of State. It refers in particular to the second half of sub-paragraph (b) of the subsection, which makes it an offence to use,
"equipment constructed or adapted for any purpose of diving or salvage operations …".
I proposed by means of the amendment to make that read,
"diving, dredging or salvage operations".
It is clear enough that a person commits an offence if he dives or uses salvage equipment to bring up anything from a wreck: that is dealt with in a perfectly straightforward way under sub-paragraph (a).
Sub-paragraph (b) makes it an offence to use diving or salvage equipment within a restricted area: in other words, it is possible to catch the offender before he

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gets on to the wreck. The mere fact of having the equipment in the area is an offence. The question is what kind of equipment he can use. The Bill specifies diving and salvage equipment, but how about a dredger? This could be a splendid instrument for bringing things up from the bottom of the sea. I can imagine a man saying to his wife, "My dear, this is a nice sunny day. Shall we take out the old dredger this afternoon? How about going to have a look at the Mary Rose to see what we can get up from her?" I do not really imagine that that is possible or likely, but there are things which are much more likely when a restricted area has been announced or it is known that the Secretary of State is likely to announce one.
I believe that it is possible to hire dredgers. There are various types and sizes; there are suction dredgers and bucket dredgers, and a man who was determined to get at the wreck in question could take out a dredger by night or by day and would, as the Bill stands, be totally immune from the law until he actually dug something up. It might be remarkably difficult to prove that he had done so and I propose, therefore, that he should be liable to arrest if he brings a dredger into the restricted area. This seems to be a simple addition to the Bill and to close a considerable loophole. There may be an argument or two against the proposal, such as that dredging requires a licence, but I shall listen with interest to what my noble friend Lord Ferrers has to say. In the meantime, I hope that he is having a happy day, and wish him many happy returns on his birthday. I beg to move.
EARL FERRERS: First may I thank my noble friend Lord Cork for his closing remarks. I can only say that my day would have been even more happy had he not put down any Amendments to the Bill. I am bound to say that I thought his Amendment a very good and reasonable one when I saw it. My noble friend has a vivid imagination but the Amendment also stimulated my imagination, because, clearly, if one dives to remove items from a wreck, one is contravening the Bill, but my noble friend has the idea that one might go into the area with a dredger and cut through what is on the bottom and hook up dubloons in the cups
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of the dredger without committing any offence.
However, under Section 34 of the Coast Protection Act the consent of the Secretary of State is needed for dredging, so I think that anyone who had that idea in mind would fall foul of that provision. In most cases, a person wishing to use a dredger also requires a licence from the Crown Estate Commissioner to dredge. My noble friend may say, "He is not dredging but only cutting through what lies on the bottom, and if anyone came to complain at the dredger working he might say that he was merely oiling his equipment."In that case, however, he would be caught under Clause 1(3)(a) of the present Bill, which makes it an offence to tamper with or damage or remove anything from whatever lies on the bottom of the sea bed. I therefore suggest to my noble friend that, while I have a great deal of sympathy for his Amendment, it is unnecessary.
THE EARL OF CORK AND ORRERY: I am not quite clear about my noble friend's argument, which I may have misunderstood. If I have, he will no doubt correct me. I made the point that anybody who takes a dredger, dredges, and gets something up has committed an offence. That is clearly the case because he is caught under sub-paragraph (a) as having tampered with, damaged or removed some part of the vessel or contents. However, that does not make it unnecessary to have sub-paragraph (b), whether it applies to dredging or not. It is additional and it already refers to carrying out diving or salvage operations. My noble friend would not argue against that on the grounds that if anybody carries out diving or salvage operations he is committing an offence if he brings anything up. He is also committing an offence if he goes down, and in my submission it is equally necessary to include the word "dredging" to complete the full list of machinery which a man can use for the purpose of committing an offence.
As to the matter of a licence and such cognate matters, what I am really visualising—and my imagination is not now quite so extravagant as it was a few moments ago—is a case in which there is a considerable and worthwhile amount of loot to be found on the bottom of the

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sea-bed in a known place and a resourceful person who is determined to go and get it, it representing to him a very high value. Is he likely to be deterred, if he is otherwise in a position to do so, from carrying out that operation by the knowledge that he has no licence for it? He is setting out to commit what he knows is intended by the law to be a crime.
He knows, furthermore, that he will make a very high profit. He is taking a certain amount of risk for the sake of that high profit. How big must the penalty for not having a licence be in order to deter such a person? It is my suspicion that the fact that he has no licence will not deter him, and if my noble friend thinks that it will, I must say that it is rather touching. I admire and enjoy the simple faith in human nature that can think that anybody who is going to commit a rather expensive and elaborate crime will say to himself, "Oh, gracious, I have no licence—I can't do that." I therefore still think that the Amendment would be a valuable addition to the Bill. It would close a loophole. It would do no harm, and I do not think it can be described as unnecessary. I do not wish to be boastful, but I see no flaw in the drafting and altogether I rather inclined to stick to it.
EARL FERRERS: My Lords, I hope that my noble friend will be open to reason over this. The whole point of putting in the word "dredgers" is to ensure that those who use dredgers will not be able to do that which the noble Lord does not want them to do. I can assure him that, if they were to do this and to remove pieces of wreck, they would be falling foul of the Bill as it stands, by, as I explained to him, Clause 1(3)(a), because they would be tampering with, damaging or removing a part of the vessel.
My noble friend went on to ask if they would be deterred by the knowledge that they had no licence. Of course, the only deterrent to anything is knowing that one is committing an offence and if one dredges without having a licence one is committing an offence. But then my noble friend went on to say that such a person, knowing that there was a big profit to be attached by obtaining these items, would go on to recover what he
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could. If he did that, he would be committing an offence under Section 518 of the Merchant Shipping Act 1894, because that requires delivery as soon as possible of any wreck to the Receiver of Wrecks; and if a person were to dig up parts of a wreck and not take them to the Receiver of Wrecks, he would be committing an offence. So, on all those counts, the gentleman whom my noble friend has in mind would be contravening regulations. Whilst I take my noble friend's point about dredging, I think that it is unnecessary to insert it into the Bill because the very point which he has in mind is already covered.
LORD KENNET: My Lords, I think that my noble friend Lord Cork is right and that there is nothing against putting dredging into the Bill, but I do not know that he has it in mind to proceed to a Division at this stage because I am not sure that there would be a quorum if he did. Since there is a Report stage coming, I wonder whether he would consider leaving it as a probing amendment for the moment and returning to fight another day.
VISCOUNT AMORY: The suggestion opens up a thrilling activity which I have never seriously considered before. Without declaring any intention of taking it up, I was trying to visualise while my noble friend was speaking what would happen when one took one's dredger into an area close to a wreck and started operations. I gather that it would not be very productive in terms of a tip and run raid, that one would not dash in, scoop something off the bottom and make off again very quickly. One would have to settle down to do considerable work and be stationary with the dredger for some considerable time. During that time, surely the authorities would begin to ask for licences and so on and the offences would come to be declared. If it were a matter of people being able to dash in and scoop up something and get away again, I should have thought that there would have been considerable weight behind my noble friend's suggestion.
THE EARL OF CORK AND ORRERY: My Lords, the idea of a dredger dashing anywhere is an interesting one. Probably it would not, though it might be possible, but I think that the wisest thing that

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has been said during the last few minutes was said by my noble friend Lord Kennet. I should like for the moment to leave the matter where it is, without any promise not to bring it up again. I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
12.27 p.m.
LORD KENNET LORD KENNET moved Amendment No. 2:
Page 2, line 46, at end insert—
("(5A) The responsibility for the enforcement of the criminal provisions of this Act shall rest with the Coastguard Service, who shall pay especial attention to it during the period between its becoming known that the Secretary of State is minded to make an order, and the granting of a licence.")
The noble Lord said: At Second Reading we had some discussion about the difficulty of enforcing the Bill, and the Amendment is an amateur attempt to introduce a greater element of enforcement than is to be found in the Bill as it stands. I do not propose to press it on the House. It is a probing Amendment, because the drafting is certainly defective. The Amendment contains two ideas. First, it says that it shall be the job of the Coastguard Service to enforce the Bill. On Second Reading, the noble Earl, Lord Ferrers, told the House that he intended the Bill to be enforced by the Commissioners of Wrecks, most of whom were also coastguards. That seems, at first sight, a little messy: why not make it the coastguards as such? Otherwise, if there is a Commissioner of Wrecks who is not a coastguard he will not be able to enforce the Bill, and if there is a coastguard who is not a Commissioner of Wrecks it is a pity that he should not be allowed to enforce it. This would lay the burden on the coastguards as the most appropriate service. There is also a certain advantage in naming them in the Bill because everybody then knows where they stand.
The second point in the Amendment is slightly more complicated. The noble Earl told us on Second Reading that the first thing the Secretary of State would do when he was minded to make an order would be to advertise in the appropriate publications where the wreck was, and why he intended to protect it, and to hold consultations with in
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formed persons about what to do. From the moment it is advertised to the moment when he makes the order may be some weeks or months; from the moment when he makes the order to the moment when he issues a licence under the order to somebody to exploit the wreck may be more weeks and months. I have had it strongly impressed upon me by divers and people experienced in this business that by far the best protector of a wreck is the licensee, the man who has his own interest in exploiting it. He will go to some trouble and pains to keep everybody else away and will call in the coastguard if he sees somebody having a go at his wreck. I think that this is a true argument.
So I am worried about this long period during which all the diving community, including the "baddies", are publicly informed that there is a historic wreck at such and such a latitude and longitude mark. It is an invitation to them to go and pilfer it before there is any protection, which they might not want or know how to do if this invitation were not extended. The purpose of the Amendment is therefore to put a special responsibility upon the enforcement body —the Coastguard Service—to protect the wreck during the period when it is especially vulnerable.
EARL FERRERS: I readily accept that the noble Lord, Lord Kennet, has put his finger on what one might describe as the weakest point in this particular form of legislation. Of course it is possible for people to take advantage of the notice that there is a wreck there, before the order is made. But my honourable friend the Parliamentary Under-Secretary in another place said that it was not the Government's intention to devote any additional resources to police these designated sites. The receivers of wreck, Her Majesty's coast guard and the police, will be asked to do all that they reasonably can to ensure that no unauthorised person interferes with a designated site. But we really are not in a position to provide additional resources to mount patrols or to keep a continuous watch on a protected site which may be remote. The police, apart from assisting with local inquiries, are not being asked to accept a primary enforcement role.

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It is perfectly true that people may take advantage and may, having been told where the wreck is, go and loot it, but of course if they do they are contravening the law at the moment, because they have to bring such loot anyhow to the receivers of wreck. I would assure the noble Lord, Lord Kennet, that if there is any real likelihood of this happening or of a particularly historic wreck being found, or there is any fear of looting, an immediate order can be made by the Secretary of State under Clause 1(4). This would of course obviate that problem.
LORD KENNET: I think the noble Earl's answer is defective on both points. My Amendment does not seek to lay upon the coastguards or anybody else the duty of running special patrols or getting special boats or increasing their activities; it only specifies where the responsibility lies. I do not know what objection there can be to doing that. On the second point, where the noble Earl said that anybody who went and looted a wreck during the waiting period would be breaking the law anyhow, to the extent that that is true this whole Bill is unnecessary. If people are already breaking the law by looting wrecks and not telling the Commissioner, then we do not need a Bill. I wonder whether the noble Earl would be so good as to turn over those objections in his mind between now and the next stage. If he would, I would seek to withdraw the Amendment at the moment.
EARL FERRERS: Of course I will give the noble Lord that undertaking. I readily recognise that this is a weak part of the Bill, but short of providing extra resources and putting extra commitments on to other sources we think it is right at the moment to retain this weakness, because there is always the provision which I have mentioned to overcome it. But I will certainly take the noble Lord's point.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
On Question, Whether Clause 1 shall stand part of the Bill?
LORD KENNET: On Second Reading I asked the noble Lord whether he could tell the House anything about two matters. First, the protection of wrecks on
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land—he has written to me courteously about that and I do not think it necessary to detain the Committee to discuss it any further. That matter is in my opinion all right. The other thing I asked him about was the protection of wrecks in the opposite direction, outside the three-mile territorial waters limit. I wonder whether he is now able to inform the Committee whether—and if so,when—the Government intend to introduce legislation which will, first, extend the present measures of protection beyond the three-mile limit where there are also historic wrecks, and secondly, will seek to co-ordinate and make sense in general of the whole welter of unco-ordinated and historically accidental powers which exist and conflict for the Government to control what goes on in the sea, on the sea bed and under the sea bed within territorial waters.
EARL FERRERS: As the noble Lord will realise, this Bill will place some limitation on wrecks within United Kingdom waters, on the freedom of salvagers and others to do, with licence from the Secretary of State, a number of things which they have been otherwise free to do. We can of course impose these limitations within our own three-mile limit, because they are our own territorial waters. I accept the noble Lord's concern that we might like to do something outside those territorial waters, but when we come to that point we come on to the fact that we are dealing with the high seas. Anything which is done in those circumstances can be done only by international agreement. The noble Lord referred on Second Reading, I think, to oil fields, the delivery of oil by pipeline and so forth. But of course all those matters were arrived at as a result of international consultation and at international conferences, as a result of which we were able to produce legislation. Until we get such international agreement we cannot ourselves introduce legislation to cover areas outside the three-mile limit.
However, the noble Lord, Lord Kennet, will doubtless know that a Law of the Sea Conference is being held in Santiago next year. We shall be involved in some very delicate negotiations at that Conference, at which a number of important national interests which we are anxious to safeguard will be brought up. I am bound

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to tell the noble Lord that I cannot forecast what may come out of that Conference, nor can the Government therefore give any undertaking as to what form of legislation might result after the Conference has taken place.
The noble Lord on Second Reading also referred to a number of points about which he was concerned. He listed 41 different operations which took place on or near the sea bed and he has asked to-day when the Government are going to undertake to bring in any legislation dealing with these points. I am sure he will realise that these 41 totally different things—ranging from tunnels, cables, pipelines and offshore terminals even to beach recreation and swimming—are so diverse as really to make any comprehensive legislation almost impossible. I therefore cannot give any assurance that the Government will produce any legislation combining all these things, nor indeed do I think that it would be desirable. If we are going to control even such things as recreation and swimming, angling and bait-digging, we shall really be getting into quite sticky waters.
Clause 1 agreed to.
Clause 2 agreed to.
Clause 3 [Supplementary provisions:]
12.39 p.m.
LORD KENNET LORD KENNET moved Amendment No. 3:
Pae 3, line Dave out from ("above") to ("may") in line 40.
The noble Lord said: I should like to apologise for the fact that I shall probably have to leave in the middle of my remarks on this Amendment, if the Committee will not find me discourteous. I know that I shall leave the Amendment in good hands with Lord Cork. The purpose of the Amendment is to remove the provision whereby every single protection order on every single historic wreck has to be laid before Parliament and is subject to Parliamentary approval. I simply do not think that this is necessary. I do not believe that Parliament will want it. I do not think that the extra delay is justifiable in this case. I believe that there is a case for assimilating the procedure under this Bill with the procedure under the historic buildings legislation, where of course there is no question of
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specific Parliamentary approval for each individual order. I beg to move.
THE EARL OF CORK AND ORRERY: To that, of course, I say a hearty "Hear, hear!". I apologise to the noble Lord, Lord Kennet, for not instantly stepping in so that he could go off and meet his Chinese friends. I feel he can go ahead with it by himself now.
VISCOUNT AMORY: My Lords, I would only say that any proposal which would make it unnecessary to lay a Parliamentary order requires sympathetic attention. The number of orders that now have to be laid is astronomical. If we can reduce it even by one we should do so. I shall therefore listen with great interest to anything my noble friend says about this proposal.
EARL FERRERS: This particular provision is a perfectly simple one: to give final Parliamentary control over any executive action that might be taken by the Secretary of State. In the normal course of events that would be a laudable reason. That is the sole purpose behind the provision. The noble Lord, Lord Kennet, said that this would result in delay. In fact, it will not result in delay because any such Order which is introduced or laid by the Secretary of State will be subject to the Negative Resolution procedure. It will therefore come into force immediately, subject to anyone praying againgst the order within the period of 40 days. I do not think that his analogy with historic buildings legislation is wholly apt, because there are far more historic buildings, which are designated as such, than ever there would be historic wrecks or wrecks of archæological importance. By making such a designation area the Secretary of State is impinging on the freedom of people to do what they would otherwise be allowed to do. Therefore the Government considered that it was reasonable that Parliament should have the right of approving or disapproving this particular action which the Secretary of State would take. It will not involve any delay at all.
THE EARL OF CORK AND ORRERY: I am, in general, in favour of Parliamentary control over the Government, but I wondered whether it might not be reasonable in this case to let the Secretary of State get on with it. It seems to

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me that this is something about which Parliament need not concern itself particularly. On the other hand, the arguments put forward by my noble friend for the Government seem cogent and reasoned, and I think it would be better to ask leave to withdraw the Amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Clause 3 agreed to.
Remaining clause agreed to.
House resumed: Bill reported without amendment.

DOMICILE AND MATRIMONIAL PROCEEDINGS BILL
12.45 p.m.
LORD SIMON OF GLAISDALE: My Lords, I beg to move that the House do now resolve itself into Committee on this Bill.
Moved, That the House do now resolve itself into Committee.—(Lord Simon of Glaisdale.)
On Question, Motion agreed to.
House in Committee accordingly.
[The LORD ALPORT in the Chair.]
Clauses 1 and 2 agreed to.
Clause 3 [Age at which independent domicile can be acquired:]
LORD SIMON OF GLAISDALE: I apologise that I gave no notice to the Chair that I wished to say anything on this clause, but I felt that I should correct a matter I mentioned on Second Reading. I do not think it affected my argument, but I did not want to leave it incorrect on the Record. I mentioned that the age at which one could acquire an independent domicile was now 21. In fact, though the matter was not dealt with expressly in the Family Law Reform Act, that Act indirectly reduced the age of majority to 18 because it reduced the age of majority to 18 for the purpose of any rule of law. On thinking over the matter afterwards, I realised that it was a rule of common law that fixed the age of majority. I felt that I should draw your Lordships' attention to that matter.
Clause 3 agreed to.
Clauses 4 and 5 agreed to.
Clause 6 [Miscellaneous amendments, transitional provision and savings:]
On Question, Whether Clause 6 shall stand part of the Bill?
LORD SIMON OF GLAISDALE: My Lords, I should like to say a word about this clause for the Record. A drafting point arises. At the moment it is a rule of statutory interpretation that the courts may not look at debates in Parliament in order to construe an Act, but that matter is at the moment under consideration with the Law Commission. In case the rule should be modified, I think I should say what I conceive that this clause means. The point arises in subsection (1)(b), where the words are "habitually resident", and in subsection (1)(c), where the word is "resident". The words "habitually resident" occur frequently in the Bill. When the courts see a change of terminology of this sort they are immediately put on the alert that that is intended, as it is. They are bound to ask why (b) has the term "habitually resident" and (c) "resident".
This matter has a rather unlucky history. As the clause was framed first by the Law Commission, it was not precisely in this form, but when the proposal was finally published, the equivalent of (c) contained the word "resident" and (b) "habitually resident". Then, apparently, the Law Commission realised that it would raise the sort of doubt to which I have referred, and before the Bill was introduced, when redrafting it for introduction, they put the words "habitually resident" in (c) as well as in (b).
When the Bill was considered in Committee in another place it was queried whether "habitually resident" was an appropriate phrase for (c). The argument was that one could not be habitually resident at a certain place at a single date. Therefore the Bill was amended to take the form that it has at the moment. The courts might well take that view and say that that is clearly the reason that "resident" is used in (c) and "habitually resident" in (b). On the other hand, they might say—and I should be in sympathy with them—that one could be habitually resident in a place on a certain date. For example, I can be habitually resident tonight in London even though I might spend the night with a friend in the country.

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Therefore, it seems to me that there is a real danger that the courts might say that "resident" in (c) must mean something less than "habitually resident"; in other words, merely sojourning. That is not the intention of the promoters of the Bill, nor is it the intention of the Law Commission, as I understand it. I considered inviting your Lordships to reinstate the word "habitually" in (c); but, the other place having made the Amendment, that seemed to me inappropriate. It might delay the enactment of a valuable measure of reform which has been widely welcomed. Therefore, I thought it better to deal with the matter as I have, trying to put on record why the word "resident" and not the words "habitually resident" appears in (c), and that it is not intended to mean merely sojourning.
Clause 6 agreed to.
Clauses 7 to 15 agreed to.
12.52 p.m.
Clause 16 [Non-judicial divorces:]
LORD SIMON OF GLAISDALE LORD SIMON OF GLAISDALE moved Amendment No. 1:
Page 13, line 12, at end insert—
("( ) Notwithstanding anything in section 6 of the Recognition of Divorces and Legal Separations Act 1971 (as substituted by section 2 of this Act), a divorce which—

(a) has been obtained in a country outside the United Kingdom, the Channel Islands and the Isle of Man, and

(b) has been so obtained by means of a proceeding other than a proceeding instituted in a court of law, and

(c) is not required by any of the provisions of sections 2 to 5 of that Act to be recognised as valid,

shall not be regarded as validly dissolving a marriage if both parties to the marriage have during the period of one year immediately preceding the institution of the proceeding been habitually resident in the United Kingdom.
In this subsection "country" includes a colony or other dependent territory of the United Kingdom.")
The noble Lord said: Your Lordships will remember that the purpose of this clause is to prevent persons habitually resident in this country from being non-judicially divorced by reasons of our rules of common law. It arises mainly in respect of Islamic divorces by instant repudiation, and it was conceived to be a hardship that we should be compelled by our rules of international law to recog-
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nise the repudiation of a perfectly innocent wife and allow the safeguards of judicial divorces in this country to be bypassed. For example, a wife could be left in this country without any means and thrown on the meagre resources provided by the taxpayer. The general purpose of Clause 16 was to prevent that.
As I mentioned on Second Reading, without going into the facts I was not altogether happy about its form—the clause says "No proceeding in the United Kingdom", and so on; and it would be easy for, say, a Moslem husband resident permanently in England but domiciled in a country which permitted Talak divorce—divorce by instant repudiation by a husband—to take the day boat to Calais and pronounce his Talak there. Equally, a similar husband resident in Belfast could take the train to Dublin and pronounce his Talak there. The proceeding would be outside the United Kingdom, the Channel Islands or the Isle of Man, and we should have to regard it as validly dissolving the marriage if it was regarded as such by the law of the man's domicile or, possibly, by the law of the common domicile. This seemed to me a lacuna in the Bill, a means by which it could be too easily evaded to the detriment of wives.
On the other hand, we are bound by The Hague rules, the rules negotiated at the conference at The Hague in 1969 or 1970—I think in both years—to recognise foreign divorces in certain circumstances. First, we have to recognise them if they are valid under the law of the nationalities, and secondly, if they are valid under the law of habitual residence. It is desirable that this country should be able to legislate as we have legislated, and to adhere to that convention. It prevents limping marriages; in other words, parties being considered to be married in one country and not married in the other.
However, The Hague rules, although implemented in the Recognition Act of 1971, which is mentioned in Clause 2 of the Bill, did not prevent the wider grounds of recognition by our common law rules. Section 6 of the Recognition Act, as sought to be amended by Clause 2, allows the continuation of our common law rules of recognition, modified to meet the case of the abolition of dependent domicile of married women. The

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result is that there was very little room for manœuvre to meet the case that I mentioned, whereby the provisions of Clause 16 could be evaded. My Amendment seeks to occupy such room for manœuvre as was available. The courts are bound to refuse recognition when both parties to the marriage have, during a period of one year preceding the institution of proceedings—the Talak proceedings or similar non-judicial divorce —been habitually resident in the United Kingdom. Undoubtedly, that will give rise to limping marriages, but it is limited to the case when both parties are permanently resident in this country.
It was in order to limit the ambit and scope of limping marriages that I have ventured to limit the case to both parties being resident here, although it is the residence of the wife here that gives rise to the case of hardship. On the other hand, if the husband is not habitually resident here, the wife has no effective remedy against him in any case. So it seemed right to me to limit it to cases of joint residence in order to limit the possibility of limping marriages to no effective purpose.
The other provision is that there shall be habitual residence for one year by both parties. That is in line with the provision in Clause 5(2)(b), whereby the wife or the husband could file jurisdiction on the ground of one year's habitual residence immediately before the proceedings. In other words, the Amendment does not prevent divorce in this country at all; it merely prevents the recognition of non-judicial divorces on the part of persons who are permanently resident in this country, at least for one year before the proceedings. I beg to move.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR (LORD HAILSHAM OF SAINT MARYLEBONE): I would advise the Committee to accept this Amendment. It has been very fully explained by my noble and learned friend. It is highly technical, but I have taken very careful advice about this, and it is acceptable to the Government.
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
Clause 16, as amended, agreed to.
Clause 17 agreed to.
Schedule 1 [Staying of Matrimonial Proceedings (England and Wales)]:
1.3 p.m.
LORD WHEATLEY LORD WHEATLEY moved Amendment No. 2:
Page 15, line 4, leave out ("on the application of a party to the marriage") and insert ("whether as a result of informaton furnished in pursuance of paragraph 7 hereof or otherwise—")
The noble and learned Lord said: This Amendment and the corresponding Amendment to Schedule 3 are based on similar considerations, and accordingly I can spare those of your Lordships who have stayed the course the burden of a second speech when I come to the second Amendment. These Amendments relate to the procedure which has to be followed in the event of each partner to a marriage raising similar matrimonial proceedings, such as actions for divorce, in different courts in what is called, in the Bill, a related jurisdiction. As a result of the Bill a husband and a wife may have separate jurisdictions entitling them to raise proceedings in different countries, but seeking the same legal remedy, such as divorce.
In what are called related jurisdictions, provision is made in such circumstances for the court to stay or, as we say in Scotland, sist the proceedings in one of the courts, so that only one of the actions will proceed. The obligation on the court to stay or sist the proceedings is mandatory and not discretionary in such cases. The purpose underlying this is very commendable. It is to have the proceedings tried in the more appropriate court, and the test is set out in paragraph 8(1)(c) of Schedule 1 and the corresponding paragraph (8)(c) of Schedule 3. Broadly speaking, the appropriate court is deemed to be the court of the matrimonial home where the parties last resided together—the court of the country most closely related to the marriage. The related jurisdictions are England and Wales, Scotland, Northern Ireland, the Channel Islands and the Isle of Man.
As the Bill has come to your Lordships' House from another place, the courts could grant this mandatory stay or sist only on the application of a party to the proceedings—a party to the marriage. While standing the general provisions of the Bill, it was manifestly desirable to

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have provision for such a stay or sist if one considers, for example, the case where a husband and a wife have each raised an action of divorce, one in Scotland and the other in England. They are both seeking the same remedy, divorce. It would manifestly be a waste of public time and of money, public and/or private, to allow both actions to proceed to the end in each case. This is the justification in the Bill for the mandatory sist, and a guide to the determination of the appropriate court in which the action should be carried on.
Your Lordships will observe that in paragraph 7 of both Schedule 1 and Schedule 3 there is an obligation on the parties to the proceedings to furnish information about any other proceedings known to be continuing in another jurisdiction which are in respect of the marriage or capable of affecting its validity or subsistence. This information is clearly for the benefit of the court. The purpose of my Amendment is simply to give the court the right, on its own initiative if need be, to stay or sist the proceedings in the light of the information before it, and not, as would happen under the Bill as it stands, to confine the court to exercising this power only on the application of one of the parties to the marriage.
I fully recognise that in most cases there will be an incentive for at least one of the parties to make such an application to the court, but there may be cases where this is not done. There could be a variety of reasons why it is not done. May I cite one? Both parties may be very anxious to get a divorce as quickly as possible. Each raises the action, but one is raised in England and the other in Scotland. They may agree to allow both actions to proceed with a view to seeing which court grants decree first, in order to get the decree at the earliest possible date. There may be other reasons why parties would not make the application. Even if this situation should arise only on rare occasions—that one of the parties to the proceedings does not make the application to the court—I see no reason why, in logic or in common sense, there should not be given to the court this reserve power to raise on its own initiative the question of the stay or sist of the proceedings, and to grant the
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stay or the sist even if neither party has made the application for it.
It seems to me that my proposal closes a possible gap in what is otherwise regarded as a very desirable procedure. The fact that the court's power might have to be exercised in this way on only a few occasions seems to me to be no reason for not having it. With the new basis of jurisdiction which this Bill confers and with the continuing differences in the laws of England and Scotland on the grounds for divorce, the situation which I have contemplated might arise more often than some people think. Be that as it may, it seems to me to be wrong to place a court of law in the situation that it knows that there is a similar action pending in a related jurisdiction, that that other jurisdiction is obviously the more appropriate jurisdiction, and yet the court can do nothing about it because neither of the parties has made the application for the stay or the sist. My Amendments are designed to give the court that power.
It may be said that the English Law Commission and the English judges are in favour of the Bill as it stands, whereas the Scottish Law Commission and Scottish judges who have expressed views are in favour of the proposal contained in my Amendment. These may be persuasive arguments one way or the other, but the fact that these views are held, while highly persuasive, is not decisive, and I should not like this matter to be decided on the basis of an international match. I think this is possibly about the only point where there has been a difference of view between the two Law Commissions. It is a highly procedural one, but in my view it is quite important.
The question is one for your Lordships, and I invite your Lordships to consider the issues on their merits. I have tried to explain a technical legal procedure as simply as I can. I must confess that I have found no satisfactory answer to the proposal to give this reserve power to the court to deal with cases where the parties have refused to avail themselves of the right to apply for the stay or the sist. I consider that the Amendment is both logical and supported by common sense. If the basic considerations are to prevent the unnecessary duplication of proceedings and to secure that the court which deals with the action is the court

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of the country most closely connected with the marriage, I do not see why the court itself should not have the power to see that effect is given to that highly commendable purpose. If there is any good reason, in logic or in common sense, why this should not be done, other than simply that some people do not like it, I shall be very happy to consider that reason. In the meantime, my Lords, I beg to move.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: We have given very careful attention to this matter, which has been threshed out in private a great many times and at very great length, and we cannot advise the House to accent an Amendment of this kind. As the noble and learned Lord on the Cross-Benches has explained, the position is that the two Law Commissions took different points of view, and we have proposed what is, in effect, a compromise. I must correct him—unless I am myself mistaken—upon an important point in his argument. There is no question of duplication of proceedings here. The Bill, as drafted, fully prevents the duplication of proceedings. The question is whether the court, against the will of the parties and against its own better judgment, should be compelled to stay the set of proceedings which everybody wants to continue. That is the view which the noble and learned Lord, by his Amendment, seeks to impose upon the parties. That seems to me to be wholly unreasonable.
The position really is this. Both courts—I am taking England and Scotland as the typical example, as he has done, although perhaps it is not the only possible case—have jurisdiction under the Bill, but if two sets of proceedings are started it is obvious that one has to stop. The process of stopping is known as a stay in England and a sist in Scotland. Supposing either party applies to stop one set of proceedings, the two courts have each the same set of rules under the other provisions of the Bill to decide which has to stop. To put is crudely, but not accurately, the test applied is where the last matrimonial home was—on which side of the Border. Again, that seems a perfectly reasonable thing to have done. It was, in fact, against the better judgment of the Englishmen, and done as a concession to
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the Scots; we decided to put it forward as a compromise.
Now the question arises, supposing neither party makes an application to stay the proceedings, because it wants to go on in England rather than Scotland; both want a divorce; both are agreed that England is more convenient to them than Scotland. The effect of the Amendment would be to say that the court is not merely entitled but bound to say, "No, you cannot go on here, despite the fact that you want to; you must go across the Border to the Scots court." Of course, vice versa, the same situation would arise. This seems to me to be wholly unreasonable. I am bound to tell the noble and learned Lord that if he wants to fetter a Scots court in this way, when he comes to Amendment No. 3 it may be that the House would wish to do so, although I should advise it not to. But I must say that when he seeks to fetter the English courts in this way, this is the biggest interference with English affairs done by Scotland since Bonnie Prince Charlie took Derby.
LORD SIMON OF GLAISDALE: In view of what my noble and learned friend, the Lord Chancellor, has said, and judging as best I can the merits of this case, I could not possibly advise the House to accept this Amendment. But before I deal with it, may I express a word of thanks to my noble and learned friend Lord Wheatley. My noble and learned friend; Lord Kilbrandon, had undertaken, if he could, to be present during discussion of the Scottish provisions of this Bill, to see that I did not fall into a grievous error. He could not be present to-day, owing to one of his manifold other public duties, and although my noble and learned friend, Lord Wheatley, came here with the hostile intention of moving this Amendment and the next one, he very kindly consented to perform for me what Lord Kilbrandon had undertaken, if it were necessary. Fortunately, it has not been.
So far as this Amendment is concerned, as my noble and learned friend said, this is a matter on which the Law Commissions differed, but the English judges had already made a very considerable concession. What they wanted, as expressed by a very famous Scots member of the English Judiciary, was that the matter should be left entirely

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to the discretion of the courts. In order, though, to meet the wishes of the Scots they were prepared to have a mandatory stay or sist—a mandatory stay so far as we are concerned—where the parties apply, but not to go further.
That is where the English Law Commission ended up, the Scottish Law Commission taking the view that has been so clearly expressed by my noble and learned friend. In those circumstances, since I think everybody, including my noble and learned friend, is agreed that the rules ought to be the same in both jurisdictions, the promoter of this Bill, assisted by the official advice that was made available to him, had to decide one way or the other. As my noble and learned friend, the Lord Chancellor, has said, they came down on the side of the English Law Commission's proposal, that being already a compromise.
The matter was debated in another place, where the Lord Advocate explained to the apparent satisfaction of Members there why this decision had been arrived at. I should be very reluctant now, in view of the desirability of seeing this Bill pass into law, to see the matter reopened in your Lordships' House, unless there were an overwhelming case. My noble and learned friend the Lord Chancellor has already explained why this Amendment is unacceptable. May I give two examples, to show that it is largely unnecessary, and may be, in some cases, undesirable?
The typical case will he a wife in Scotland, deserted by her husband who comes to England and acquires a domicile in England. The wife starts proceedings in Scotland, based on desertion or possibly on some other matrimonial offence. The husband starts proceedings in England, based on the irretrievable break-down of the marriage and the separation of the parties for five years. Quite obviously, the wife in that case will apply to stay the English proceedings, so that in the vast number of cases the point that is made by my noble and learned friend, Lord Wheatley, is unnecessary.
But take another case. Take an occasion where the matrimonial home was in Scotland and the parties separate in doubt-
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ful circumstances. It may be desertion by the husband; it may be constructive desertion by the wife. The wife starts proceedings in Scotland, where she has a forum, based on desertion. The husband starts proceedings in England, where he has a forum, too, on the ground of five years' separation and irretrievable breakdown. If my noble and learned friend Lord Wheatley has his way, on those facts coming to the knowledge of the English court, as they must, the English court must stay its proceedings in England, and say that the wife must continue her doubtful case in Scotland, before they can assume jurisdiction. That seems to me to be highly inconvenient. For that reason, as well as those put forward by my noble and learned friend the Lord Chancellor, I would advise the House not to accept this Amendment.
1.23 p.m.
BARONESS SEROTA: My Lords, as a mere lay magistrate I hesitate to intervene between the noble and learned Lords, who have given the Committee the benefit of their expertise on what, I think we all understand to be a highly technical procedural point, aimed at avoiding duplication of the courts. Having listened both to the noble and learned Lord Chancellor and to the noble and learned Lord Simon, I myself would be inclined to accept the compromise that this Bill presents to the Committee. I do so, not perhaps because I understand it, but for the reasons on which the noble and learned Lord Simon touched and which perhaps I might underline.
I think that those Members who were present during the Second Reading of this Bill will recall the very powerful arguments that the noble and learned Lord Chancellor put to us for proceeding with this Bill in this Session, and for getting it passed into law as soon as possible. Many of us are aware of the long and, in some cases, sad history affecting admittedly relatively few women, but nevertheless a very vulnerable group of women. I know how hard the noble and learned Lord Chancellor has worked to get this piece of legislation to this point. We are very late in the Session. I very much hope that the Committee will agree to this part of the Schedule indeed, of both Schedules—which includes a compromise. I hesitate to inflame the war between England and Scotland, but I believe it is

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in the wider interest that we should pass the Schedules as at present drafted, rather than risk returning amended Schedules to another place, for that might then result in holding up this very important piece of social legislation. As I said a moment ago, although the Bill affects relatively few women, it has received a very wide measure of support, not only from both Houses, but also among the women's movement.
LORD WHEATLEY: My Lords, may I say that I would not insist in moving the Amendment to Schedule 3 if it were the view of the Committee that my Amendment to Schedule 1 should not be accepted, because manifestly, it is desirable that the same procedure and the same formula should apply in both countries. I can give the Committee that assurance.
Unfortunately, I felt that I was being drawn by the noble and learned Lord Chancellor into the position that I was trying to avoid, namely an international match. One could spend a great deal of time—but not at this time on a Friday—in a spicy argument as to which country interfered most with which. I do not think we would require to go back to the days of Bonny Prince Charlie to get ammunition for that particular argument.
My Amendment was not intended to be hostile. It was not intended to resurrect any old disputes between the Law Commissions in this very narrow field—I repeat, this very narrow field. It was because I thought, and this was the view of my colleagues, that it really improved the Bill. I still think that it would improve the Bill. I still think it is desirable. With all due respect to the noble and learned Lord Chancellor and to my noble and learned friend Lord Simon of Glaisdale, I am not persuaded by the arguments, but I do not think it is worth while occupying your Lordships' time by going into it in any greater detail. I did not think that the examples necessarily met the point. I still think that it leaves a lacuna in the proceedings, and that it is possible that the underlying purpose of this part of the procedure could be defeated on what I had hoped to be the odd occasion and only the odd occasion. In view of the opinions which
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have been expressed, I humbly beg leave to withdraw the Amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Schedule 1 agreed to.
Remaining Schedules agreed to.
House resumed: Bill reported, with the Amendment.

EMPLOYMENT AGENCIES BILL
1.30 p.m.
LORD MOTTISTONE: My Lords, I beg to move that this Bill be read a second time. It is indeed a privilege to be invited to sponsor this Bill, which was introduced as a Private Member's Bill by one of my honourable friends in another place, where it happily reached its Third Reading. As your Lordships may be aware, a somewhat similar Bill was introduced in another place a few years ago by another private Member belonging to the Party of the noble Lords opposite. On that occasion the Bill did not obtain the support of Parliament, and my honourable friend sought in this Bill to make such alterations as might make it acceptable to Parliament. So far as another place was concerned, this seems to have been largely achieved. Indeed, I think it can be said that this Bill has the support of all the major Parties in that House. I trust that your Lordships will give it a similar fair passage through your considerations.
The purpose of the Bill is to introduce a measure of regulation of employment agencies throughout the country. It will be seen from the Schedule to the Bill that many local authorities, and principally the Greater London Council, have introduced regulations to control employment agencies to a certain degree. The effect of the Bill is to bring up to date the better features of the legislation affecting this matter in the counties, and to make it country-wide. In the process of preparing the Bill, my honourable friend consulted a wide range of interested parties, including, in particular, the Federation of Personnel Services, whose membership covers all the main employment agencies in the country, the Entertainment Agents' Association, the London Boroughs Association, and the Trades Union Congress. He was also in touch with the C.B.I. and the County

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Councils Association. All the bodies concerned recognise the need for reform. Indeed, there are many criticisms of the working of employment agencies which have substance in fact, and I am sure that many of your Lordships will have experience of some of them.
Examples with which I have been associated include the unfortunate experience of a friend of mine to whom a cook was recommended. She turned out to be paralytically drunk on arrival and had immediately to be dismissed. This in itself might have been an isolated incident, but it was subsequently discovered that the same lady had been drunk on arrival when taking up a previous post. In this case, if there had been legislation of the sort proposed it is likely that the agency concerned would have taken greater trouble to prevent the occurrence in order to protect its licence. As it was, all suffered: my friend had no cook, the cook had no job, and the agency lost a customer who is likely never to return.
Another example of which I have personal knowledge is that of girls and young men who are placed in employment as clerks or as typists by an agency which draws its fee from the employer, based on the starting salary of the person involved. When the person, often young, has been employed for a relatively short time, he or she is contacted by the agency, quite unnecessarily from the point of view of the person concerned, with the offer of a so-called better job, and quite frequently is persuaded to leave the first job before having had time to settle down.
All of us who have been in employ know that in a new job there is a point of disillusionment after a certain time, when the grass on the other side of the fence seems greener. Once past this point one settles down to enjoy the job and obtain satisfaction from it. If caught at a suitable time, one can be passed on to another job. at advantage only to the agency, which receives an extra fee. As a result of this the employer suffers from lack of stability in his staff, and the employee suffers, particularly if it is one of the first jobs that he has—which in many cases it is—in being encouraged to flit from one job to another. If your Lordships give approval
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to this Bill, it will serve to make agencies think twice before pursuing such a dubious practice, for fear that if complaints are made they may lose their licence.
I choose these two examples to illustrate that there are three sets of people whom the Bill seeks to protect: the employee, who will generally benefit from a settled way of life, except when voluntarily wishing to move; the employer, who seeks a stable staff; and the employment agencies themselves. All the reputable agencies take steps to-day to provide a reasonable and useful service to both employers and employees. They are, however, threatened by agencies which at the moment can relatively easily be established in many parts of the country and which may operate without sound principles.
In quoting my examples, because of personal knowledge I have chosen those which affect employment agencies mainly concerned with domestic and commercial employment. The Bill, however, seeks to cover all types of agency except those specifically listed in Clause 13. Types of agency covered by the Bill that might be thought worthy of special mention are theatrical agencies and agencies based in this country which may be recruiting from overseas, such as those concerned with au pair girls.
Concurrently with the passage of the Bill through another place, the Employment and Social Services Sub-committee of the Expenditure Committee made its Seventh Report, in which it remarked on the problem of both agencies and employment businesses, and stated that the Federation of Personnel Services estimated that throughout the country there are probably 3,000 agencies. It also stated that in the office staff sector alone there are about 800 branches operated by at least 500 different proprietors in Greater London, and about twice these respective numbers in the whole of Great Britain. The sub-committee went on to say that a large number of agencies means that job seekers and employers have considerable freedom of choice between agencies. Therefore—and this is a benefit—they can reject those which offer inferior service. On the other hand, there is the great disadvantage that unscrupulous or inefficient agencies can easily be established and, as

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there is no uniformity of licensing, can continue in business until the inadequacy of their services loses them all custom.
The sub-committee then described how agencies and businesses operated, and concluded with the recommendation that there should be obligatory licensing of employment agencies throughout the land, and that their operation, once licensed, should be regulated by the Secretary of State. They also recommended that there should be means by which licensing authorities could obtain particulars from each other of licences issued and withdrawn. The main point in the recommendations of the Employment and Social Services sub-committee is that agencies, once licensed, should be subject to regulations made by the Secretary of State. Accordingly, as I shall attempt to explain briefly as I go through its clauses, the details of such regulations are not written into the Bill, but guidelines for what they should cover are included.
With your Lordships' permission, I should now like briefly to outline the clauses of the Bill. I apologise that this is in the middle of the lunch hour. I am not sure quite whom to sue for the lack of my lunch and I ask my own Front Bench to advise me on this: whether it should be they for guessing wrong, or our noble and learned colleagues, who had a long and tortuous argument on a Schedule to their Bill, making it impossible for one to know precisely when it would end.
To return to the clauses of this Bill: Clause 1 establishes the main requirement of the Bill, that any person to whom it applies shall not carry on the business of an employment agency or an employment business unless he has been licensed to do so by the appropriate licensing authority. The licensing requirement applies to premises, and a multi-branch operator must have each of his premises licensed. This will enable a check to be made on the suitability of each of his premises and the staff running it. For the benefit of those agencies which are currently in business, arrangements are provided for existing licensed agencies to carry on business until the licence expires.
Clause 2 sets out the rules under which an application for a licence can be made. In subsection (2) reference is made to
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the fee for a licence. At present licence fees, where effective, range between £2 and £7. It is thought that this is totally inadequate to cover the costs of the enforcing authority, and in another place it was suggested that £100 might be a more suitable sum for the first licence. It will, however, be available to the Secretary of State to prescribe different fees in different cases for example, for new licences, renewals or extended licences. There is provision for the licensing authority to give a decision in writing on an application, including the reasons if a licence is refused. This last point is perhaps a safeguard, so that those agencies which have been refused may learn precisely why. In subsection (3) reference is made to the suitability of persons who can receive a licence. There has been some argument as to whether the proposed age of twenty-one as the limit below which a licence would not be granted is the correct one. On balance, it was decided in another place that this age was the most suitable, notwithstanding recent legislation establishing eighteen as the age of majority in most respects.
Clause 3 is concerned with the revocation of licences and Clause 4 deals with appeals. In particular, any person who is aggrieved by a decision of the licensing authority may appeal to the Secretary of State. Clause 5 sets out the guidelines for the regulations which the Secretary of State may make so as to secure the proper conduct of employment agencies and employment businesses. They include the keeping of records, the prescribing of qualifications of persons running agencies, regulating advertising and safeguarding clients' money. Clause 6 introduces a restriction on charging persons seeking employment. The effect of this would be that only certain types of agency, as prescribed by the Secretary of State, would be allowed to demand a fee from any person for finding him employment or for seeking to find him employment. Clause 7 relates to the display of licences and requires that a licence be placed in a position where it can be readily be seen by persons resorting to those premises.
Clause 8 requires the licensing authorities to make annual reports to the Secretary of State on the exercise of their functions under the Act. These reports

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are open to inspection. The information on which they are based will, however, not be publicly available, except with the consent of the person supplying that information. It will be available to other licensing authorities and to the Secretary of State. This will enable an authority to check on any previous agency business of persons applying for a licence. Clause 9 empowers the licensing authorities to inspect the premises of any licence holders and gives the safeguard that any information obtained in the course of inspection shall be disclosed only under stated conditions. Clause 10 makes provision for penalties for fraudulent application and record keeping, and Clause 11 provides for the definition of offences when committed by a body corporate.
Clause 12 sets out the general conditions under which the Secretary of State shall make regulations and includes provision for consultation with representative bodies, which I think is an important point. The regulations will be one of the main features of the subsequent effect of the Bill, and I think that it is a good point that the Secretary of State, in making those regulations, shall have consultation before finally arriving at his decisions.
Clause 13 provides the definition of phrases used within the Bill. It includes identifying the difference between an employment agency, which is a business established for the purpose of finding workers employment, and an employment business which sends its own employees to work for and under the direction of a second employer. The other main point within these definitions which I should like to bring to your Lordships' notice is that the term "licensing authority" as described in broad terms covers all London boroughs, all metropolitan districts and all county councils in England, Scotland and Wales. There is also provision in Clause 13 for the exclusion of any business which is recruiting for the armed services, or any agency for the supply of nurses, as well as various other specialised forms of employment, some of which are covered by other Acts of Parliament.
To sum up, my Lords, we have a Bill which has received support from both sides of the House in another place, which embodies the recommendations of the Employment and Social Services Sub-Committee of the Expenditure Committee
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and which has the support of the reputable firms in this line of business. It provides guidelines and gives authority for the Secretary of State to introduce regulations after consulting with those most closely concerned. It places the onus for the issue of licences and the implementation of the regulations on the local authorities throughout the land and by those means makes it a local matter how this should be effective. It tries to safeguard the position of persons seeking employment and of employers and of the reputable agencies already in business. Above all, it provides a framework within which complaints of unfair or dubious practices by any of the parties concerned can be effectively handled anywhere in the country.
Moved, That the Bill be now read 2a.—(Lord Mottistone.)
1.47 p.m.
LORD DIAMOND: My Lords, I should first like to thank the noble Lord who has introduced the Bill with such a clear and persuasive speech for having taken on the responsibility of introducing it to this House and for having explained its provisions in such a straightforward and intelligible fashion. He has made it very interesting and I should have thought that he had established to your Lordships' satisfaction that this is a Bill which in general terms we ought to support. The noble Lord made it clear that both sides of the House in another place gave it general support. I think he was a little shy in not referring to the fact that it also happens to have the support of the Government, which is no bad thing to have when one is introducing a Private Member's Bill. I can assure him that so far as all those behind me are concerned, we want to facilitate the passage of the Bill.
Nevertheless, it is appropriate that the Second Reading of a Bill of this importance, which deals with the employment of human beings and the opportunity for them to spend the greater part of their working hours in either satisfactory and enjoyable or unsatisfactory and horrible conditions, should have our careful consideration. I am sure it has had this from both the noble Lord himself and from all Members of your Lordships' House. too, have given careful thought to the proposals, especially in relation to the Bill

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which we discussed only yesterday. It is very fortunate that this Bill comes so soon after that Bill, which reshapes the whole of the country's provisions for finding employment and for the training of persons in this country. I am bound to say, therefore, that although I should want to support the general principles of the Bill, when a Bill has been brought forward with such general consent it ought to have gone a fair distance further in satisfying what are current standards—not necessarily what were the standards at the time —of control of the function of finding employment.
There is an I.L.O. Convention which was negotiated as long ago as 1949. We are still not signatories to the treaty. Under the Bill we shall not be able to sign the treaty because, as the noble Lord made clear, although there are many powers in Clause 5 it is stated specifically there that those powers should not include:
"… regulating or restricting the charging of fees to employers by persons carrying on such agencies and businesses."
On the passage of the Bill in this form, therefore, this country will still not be able to adhere to the I.L.O. Convention. That is a great pity and, at the Committee stage, we ought to consider whether an appropriate amendment should be made in the Bill to enable us, as a nation, to subscribe to the I.L.O. Convention.
While we are dealing with that Convention, may I say that I should have preferred to subscribe to the Convention in the alternative way. There are two ways in which the Convention can be satisfied. First, there is everything that the Bill proposes, plus the control, or regulation, of charges and fees. The second way is to abolish fee-charging agencies within a reasonable prescribed period, in the meantime controlling them. That seems the more simple and straightforward method and one which coincides much more naturally with the major proposals which the Government introduced in this House only yesterday, to reform the whole of the employment and training functions of the State. However, the Bill does not go so far as that but, in the one exception to which I have referred, it prevents us from joining the Convention. That is one clear omission, which we should try to remedy at a later stage.
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A weakness in the Bill as at present framed is in relation to those under the age of 18—to put it more accurately, those who, under the Government's proposed legislation, would be dealt with by the Youth Employment Service. The Government are absolutely right to distinguish between two forms of service for young persons: the general Employment Service, whose function is to find a job, and the Youth Employment Service, whose function is first to find out what is best for that youth in the long run, second to get him trained for it, and third to think of the job—third, but not first.
Therefore that is a deficiency in the provisions in the Bill, in that young persons under 18 can go to commercial, fee-charging agencies, whose sole responsibility is to find a suitable job, whose sole concern is to find the job which they have been asked to find, who charge a foe for so doing and who have no possible responsibility whatsoever for training, or satisfying the long-term needs of their applicant against his immediate short-term wishes and desires. In my view, it is a weakness that there is no provision in the Bill to prevent young persons under 18, and those who would be dealt with normally by the Youth Employment Service, from being dealt with by an ordinary commercial firm, seeking a short-term remuneration for a short-term job. That is an issue to which we can return perhaps at the Committee stage.
I am not sure that the licensing authority is well described in the Bill. There is a lot to be said for having a national licensing authority, as opposed to a local one, in order to achieve uniformity. As the Government have just introduced a Bill into your Lordships' House which sets up the Manpower Services Commission, that would be the ideal instrument to act as the national licensing authority. The Commission will be concernd with these matters and will need to know the movement of labour in the areas where the licensed employment agencies are functioning. The information would be extremely valuable to them, and vice-versa.
I do not feel happy about the provisions in the Bill because, having decided in principle apparently that there

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ought to be the local licensing arrangements, the draftsmen of the Bill have failed to carry their logic and argument to the sensible conclusion. If local knowledge is going to be placed as the major argument—which I can understand, although I do not share the view—certainly the authority ought to be the local authority, and not an in-between one. I have in mind that the licensing authority is proposed to be the county, and not the district.
For example, earlier in to-day's proceedings we had reference to Southampton, which is a busy city in Hampshire. It is proposed that the licensing authority should be the Hampshire County Council—which will not have anything like the same detailed knowledge of what is going on in the place where there are most of the jobs in Hampshire, namely, Southampton. On the other hand, the district council would know. Or, to take another case, there is Plymouth and Devon. These are examples in which it is clear that the county council, as the licensing authority, will be at a disadvantage if, indeed, what is sought is a local authority to act as the licensing authority. There is no need for me to repeat that I should prefer a national authority for the reasons which I have indicated, and that the Manpower Services Commission is the ideal instrument, as a national authority.
The noble Lord, Lord Mottistone, made it clear that the Bill is a framework, in some respects, in that a whole series of regulations made by the Secretary of State under the powers conferred on him by the Bill will follow. I want to register a small, but nevertheless audible, protest against the practice of providing for the effective part of a Bill in regulations to be issued at a later stage, under our methods of delegated legislation. The excuse in the present case that, after all, this is a Private Member's Bill and not a Government Bill, will not be a wholly satisfactory one because everybody knows that it is a Bill which the Government favour. I think the polite phrase used is that the Government have greatly helped in the drafting of it. Therefore, I am looking at the representative of the Government when I say that there are several reasons why we ought to try extremely hard to depart from the grow-
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ing principle of legislation by other bodies than the Houses of Parliament. There is an increasing propensity to legislate by delegated legislation. We know that means legislation which often is never seen by a Minister and very often—although provided for—is never seen by either Chamber.
The facts as we now know them have been well-established, in particular so far as the other place is concerned, that time is simply not available to deal with Prayers against regulations which have been made under powers of this kind. It is right, therefore, that while we are battling in another Committee with this problem of how to find Parliamentary time to deal with Parliament's duties, we should look at it from the other end also, and say that one way is surely not to put too many duties upon Parliament and too many impossible strains on the timetable.
I therefore think it is right to draw attention to it at this point and to suggest, if I may, that there is a procedure which I have certainly always welcomed and which I think is open to a Government. That is, when this kind of legislation is being enacted and the Government have consulted the interests concerned, as they obviously have done and will have done, and have in mind the general shape of the regulations that they are going to make and what they wish to achieve, they should at the same time issue a code of practice. This was a very helpful document at a very difficult stage, as the noble Earl will remember, on the Industrial Relations Bill. The Government kindly provided it at a most suitable time. They did this again at a subsequent stage. I suggest to the Government that this is a very convenient method, if not of providing your Lordships' House with the possibility of proving detailed legislation, at all events of providing your Lordships' House with carefully thought out ideas by the Government on the way in which they would like to see the bodies affected behaving. I think this is something which it is useful to comment on at this stage in a Bill the guts of which are Clause 5 and where Clause 5 indicates that everything will be done by the Government at a later stage.
Having said that, I want to reassure the noble Lord who introduced the Bill that it is undoubtedly a major step in

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the right direction and we on this side would like to help it forward with such improvements as our joint wisdom in the Committee stage may enable us to achieve.
VISCOUNT FURNESS: My Lords, before making such brief remarks as I propose to make on the Bill, I should in a way declare an interest in that I am President of the Federation of Personnel Services of Great Britain, to which reference was made both by my noble friend Lord Mottistone who introduced the Second Reading of the Bill and by the noble Lord, Lord Diamond, opposite. I am also a Fellow—but a very honorary one—of the Institute of Employment Consultants and I propose to mention that organisation briefly in the course of my remarks. The Federation of which I have the honour to be president supports the Bill, as have all speakers so far. Indeed, my noble friend Lord Mottistone mentioned this fact.
I will not follow the noble Lord, Lord Diamond, into the difficult paths of I.L.O. conventions of 1949. I seem to remember long discussions of those when the previous Bill was before Parliament. Under Clause 12(2) the Secretary of State has a duty to consult
"such bodies as appear to him to be representative of the interests concerned."
Of course, so far as employment agents are concerned it is the Federation of Personnel Services, which only recently changed its name from the Employment Agents' Federation. However, in this connection I would mention briefly the Institute of Employment Consultants, which is a would-be professional body of employment agents, or "employment consultants" as they now prefer to be called. We of the Federation are hoping that if a body with professional status is being sought Her Majesty's Government will turn to the Institute, which has been in being for a number of years, to protect the interests of the employment agents.
As I have said, I do not propose to follow the noble Lord, Lord Diamond, into his Committee points. Perhaps my noble friend Lord Gowrie will take that bait—I do not know. But I should like to say that in common with everyone else who has spoken, and in so far as I can be held to be a speaker for the Federa-
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tion, which I am not officially, I support and welcome the Bill.
1.56 p.m.
THE EARL OF GOWRIE: My Lords, like other noble Lords who have missed their lunch I might easily be tempted to take any bait going, but I think we must adhere to our conventions. I should start by pointing out that I am intervening at this point not as a winder-up but as one delegated to indicate the Government's attitude to the Bill introduced to us by my noble friend Lord Mottistone with all the clarity and conviction, if I may say so, that one would expect from the Director of the Distributive Industry Training Board.
I want to say right away, even if I have been pipped by the noble Lord Lord Diamond in this, that the Bill does of course have our unqualified support. Some Government Amendments were made to the Bill while it was under consideration in another place and it is now substantially in the form in which the Government would have been prepared to introduce their own legislation had this not been pre-empted by the advent of a Private Member's Bill. We are therefore very glad to give my noble friend any encouragement and assistance he may require in promoting his Bill through all its stages in your Lordships' House. And I must say that naturally, as supporters of the Bill, we shall be most attentive to the remarks made by the noble Lord. Lord Diamond, from the Opposition Benches, although I think it would be wrong for me to say more about them at this time.
The fields of economic activity covered by the Bill are truly enormous and are best summarised by the definitions of "employment agency" and "employment business" to be found in Clause 13(2) and (3). The House will appreciate that very many different employment relationships are covered by those definitions, and the Bill provides that in future any person whose activities can be defined in that way will need to hold a licence issued by their licensing authority.
We see this as an important development for a number of reasons. Before enumerating these, it might be helpful if I gave the House a brief historical sketch of the subject. The earliest legislation in this field that I have been able to trace

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was in the Glasgow local Act of 1901. A similar provision was to be found in a Manchester Act of 1903. Both of those Acts dealt with female domestic servants' registries and, although I was not around to observe the problem, were devoted chiefly to protecting girls from immoral abuses. In 1907 the Public Health Acts (Amendment) Act was passed, giving local authorities powers to make by-laws requiring female domestic servants' registries to be registered with them and for securing their proper conduct. About 200 authorities have taken advantage of those powers. Those of your Lordships who are scholars or students of Victorian literature will know that such improvements were not before time.
It was not until the London County Council Act of 1921 that employment agencies were specifically named in legislation. Under powers contained in that Act the L.C.C. was empowered to require all employment agencies to be licensed by it and to make by-laws for ensuring their proper conduct. In those days improper conduct was construed generally to mean immoral and fraudulent conduct. Since then, about 50 other authorities have taken similar powers through their local Acts, but the by-laws which they have made bear a remarkable resemblance to those first made in London in 1921.
The "bad hat" has been able to take advantage of this situation to operate in areas where no controls exist after being refused a licence in an area where one was required. My attention was drawn quite recently to just such a case at issue between the counties of Essex and Suffolk, the former having licensing laws and the latter none.
It is against this background, therefore, that the Government welcome the Bill now before us. Commercial practices have changed beyond all recognition since 1921, and it is necessary that the rules of conduct of employment agencies should be brought up to date. Commercial pressures in a competitive arena where large sums are often involved can encourage less than ethical methods on occasion. I need only mention the often-quoted example of a secretarial agent trying to induce one of his previous placings to leave her employer so that she can earn him another placing fee. It is against this
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kind of malpractice, among others, that the regulatory powers of Clause 5 will be directed.
The attention of the Department of Employment has also been drawn to a number of cases of agencies attracting sums of money from employee clients on the pretext of finding them employment, and Clause 6 is welcomed as a means of stamping out this practice, which appears to take two forms. The first is the straightforward collection of fees, after which the employee receives no or, at most, inadequate service. Sometimes such cases can be dealt with under the Theft Act, but it does not require much ingenuity to jump over that hurdle. The second malpractice is to offer to sell lists of jobs, usually by newspaper advertisement in the underdeveloped countries, while concealing the fact that the so-called agent is in no posititon to act as intermediary in obtaining any of the jobs for the clients involved.
We stand steadfastly behind the principle that it is wrong that an employee should have to pay in order to work. Clause 6, therefore, meets with the Government's full approval. However, Clause 6 gives the Secretary of State powers to admit the charging of fees to employees in certain circumstances—for example, in the entertainment industry, as my noble friend pointed out.
However, it is not only the commercial environment in which agencies operate that has changed since 1921. New types of enterprise, indeed new types of employment relationships, have developed in the intervening years. I thought I knew what the words "employment agent" meant; but, like so much that we take for granted, things are not always what we think they are. Employment involves a contract between an employer and an employee; whereas agency, in this case, involves the intermediate function of bringing the two together so that a contract can be arranged. Nowadays, however, we have also to deal with the entirely different concept of temporary hire, in which the so-called agent is the employer and the employee is sent out on loan to the second employer. There is, therefore, legally no agency involved, and the activity is not covered by the definitions of the earlier legislation. It will be within the scope of the Bill.

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We are all familiar with the arrangement known as au pair or au pairing. It is, for all practical purposes, an employment relationship; but because it does not involve a contract of employment those who run au pair agencies are not employment agents under existing law. When this Bill becomes law, such an anomalous situation will also have been swept away, and all agencies, whether of the permanent placing, temporary hire, or au pair variety will be under the control of a licensing authority.
I should like to mention two other relevant matters. First, the Government welcome the Bill because it goes far towards aligning our arrangements with those of the other Common Market countries. It is true that, in most E.E.C. countries, private permanent placing agencies are generally prohibited, and it is none of our philosophy that such a prohibition should prevail here. However, in all the other Member States except Italy, temporary hire agencies are allowed to operate, but there is a tendency for their conduct to be brought under legislative control. France produced such legislation in 1971, Germany in 1972, and I hope that we shall be able to say that Great Britain followed suit in 1973.
There is at present no E.E.C. legislation on either aspect of this subject, but the continuing development of the Community is likely to bring increasing problems with activities of agencies across international boundaries. The E.E.C. Commission is at present examining this question, and the Bill will, so far as we can see, enable us to comply with any directives which might emanate from Brussels.
Finally, my Lords, it would not be right for me to end without some reference to the Department of Employment's own employment agency service. Yesterday we were discussing a measure which would enable the public employment service to become more competitive. We recognise that a live public service is an essential feature of a flourishing economy. We also recognise that the labour market is complex, and needs a variety of ways of bringing employers and workers together if it is to operate smoothly. Here the services of the private agencies will continue to prove most valuable, always provided that they themselves are protected by scrupulous
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national standards of conduct. I am glad to say that the leading agents' federations are wholeheartedly behind these proposals in principle, and I am glad to have heard what my noble friend Lord Furness said about them. I repeat that I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Mottistone, for the exemplary way in which he has introduced his Bill, and I should like to thank him by recommending it to your Lordships.
2.17 p.m.
LORD MOTTISTONE: My Lords, I thank your Lordships for listening so attentively to this debate. In winding up, perhaps I might take up some of the points which the noble Lord, Lord Diamond, made. I would start by thanking him for reminding me of my almost unforgivable omission to thank the Government earlier for their support, both in another place and here. I extend my thanks to them now for their support, and to my noble friend Lord Gowrie for his expression of that support.
With regard to the points raised by the noble Lord, Lord Diamond, I have picked out one or two. I regret bitterly that I was not able, because of other engagements, to be here for yesterday's debate on the Employment and Training Bill, which, as you will appreciate, is close to my heart. Whether it is as close as it should be (and I do not want to divert this debate) is another matter; but I do not know that it has all that relevance to this Bill. In particular, the suggestion which the noble Lord, Lord Diamond, made, that the licensing authority should be national rather than local, and might in itself be the Man-power Services Commission, strikes me as going rather far in centralising the whole of this activity. After all, if we try to envisage how it will apply, we are talking, among other things, about having the ability of whatever authority it is to inspect. We are talking about something that concerns people every clay within their own local community. On balance, this is the sort of thing which needs to be handled locally rather than even as a subordinate department of some central body like the Manpower Services Commission.
I believe that, when one talks about how people should be employed, and how they should be trained—and this

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is something about which I know a little —one needs to apply this within the framework in which they work or live. One of the merits of the industrial training system—and this is not a digression but an example—is that the industrial training boards are centred on sections of the community which, in the broad sense, have a common training practice.
When we come to what the licensing authorities should be, we need something surely which has a closer local look at the situation in the particular vicinity where jobs are sought. The noble Lord, Lord Diamond, cleverly covered himself by switching immediately from his Manpower Services Commission conclusion to saying that he thought that the county, in the case of the non-metropolitan counties, was too big an organisation to handle this, and that we should go to the district. That, with the greatest possible respect to the noble Lord, is a contradiction. For the same reason that to have something centred on Whitehall to look after this licensing task is to me a nonsense, I should have thought that going to the district in the non-metropolitan counties is perhaps going too far down the scale, and that a certain amount of Lord Diamond's earlier argument for viewing this matter more broadly within the county structure is applicable. I think that, on the whole, my honourable friend in another place had the balance right.
As noble Lords will know, if they have studied the various stages in another place, such a point was discussed at some length. In effect, we have arrived at a compromise about whom the licensing authority should be. The noble Lord, Lord Diamond, went right down the road in the direction that perhaps noble Lords in the Party opposite are now feeling free to do, in view of the announcements they have made as to the way they propose to handle the country if they are ever allowed to have power in the future, namely, that fee-charging agencies should be abolished, the lot should be centralised and it should all be done by the Government's employment services agency and its bureaux around the country.
It just so happens that I quoted the Seventh Report of the Employment and
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Social Services Sub-committee, in which the point was made, with all-party support, that a large number of agencies means that job-seekers and employers have a considerable freedom of choice between agencies and are therefore able to reject those which offer an inferior service. This is a fundamental point which has been agreed upon as a statement by a joint Party committee and which in itself embodies a vital issue. If there is only one sort of employment agency, such as is established in a town under the employment services agency system which is set up in a modest way, there will not be the same degree of choice. There is in this particular area of hunting for jobs a great deal to be said for having a measure of choice.
Looking round the chamber, I do not know how many of your Lordships have ever had to job-hunt, but I have, and I can assure you that the more sources that one can have to apply to in order to find a job, particularly if one is doing it from scratch, the better. When I was fortunate enough to get my first job, I had to unwind, in various ways, 50 different applications, because it had been necessary to get that far before I got the job that I was happy enough to hold. So, I suggest to the noble Lord, Lord Diamond, that although he gave us a little time and said that the fee-charging agencies would not be abolished tomorrow, if he had his way, it would perhaps be better if he did not pursue that subject.
As noble Lords will know, the I.L.O. Convention has been the subject of discussion in another place. All I would say is that it is a good thing that we are gradually coming to the stage of almost reaching the level which the I.L.O. Convention, in its wisdom, some time ago set up. Perhaps the day will come when the I.L.O. Convention will be modified to meet our requirements.
It seems to me that Clause 5(1)(g) makes a specific point about the under-18s, in
"regulating the provision of services by persons carrying on such agencies and businesses in respect of persons who are under the age of eighteen years or are undergoing full-time education."
Surely this is a very good halfway house. I should have thought that if I were under 18—and I do know some

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people under 18, apart from having children of my own—I should be keen to think that I was not wrapped up in officialdom or in schools; that I did not have to go to the Youth Employment Service to get a job. I should want to start out in life by trying to get my first job all by myself. I should not want to go to the Employment Agency, because although it will look much grander in the future it will still have connotations of its past for some time to come.
I should want to go into a well-regulated agency, set up under a licence under this Bill; an agency which took me out of my child-like existence. I should not like to feel that I was still governed by my youth employment officer or by a Government body of any sort. At that age particularly, one wants to get away from officialdom and from any form of authority, parental included. Though perhaps it might be in the best interests of the under-18s to be handled in a particular way, one has to take into account their own views. In giving the Secretary of State specific power to make provision for the under-18s, surely this system goes far enough.
Forgive me, my Lords, if I am taking up too much of your time. I shall not be much longer. I shall not go into the technical argument between the noble Lord, Lord Diamond, and the Government about whether it should be a code of practice instead of regulations. I am sure there is a technical reason why one or the other is better. The only point I can make is that I understand that the previous Bill, which was introduced into another place by one of Lord Diamond's colleagues, foundered partly because it attempted to cover too much ground. There may be various technical reasons why regulations cannot be handled on a day-to-day basis by the Houses of Parliament. When they are laid before us we never have time to look at them. But also there is surely a limit to what can effectively be put in a Bill, which on the whole does not want to be amended frequently.
The great point about having regulations is that, if one finds from experience that, for instance, one has not made enough provision for one particular category of person, then the regulations can be amended quickly. Furthermore, when it comes to discussing what they
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should be, they can be discussed in isolation without upsetting the Bill as a whole. I should have thought that this was a very good compromise. We have the guidelines for the regulations, and these are sensible and were argued very thoroughly in another place. There may be room for improvement, which I would not discount, but I think the principle is good. Finally, I should like to thank the noble Viscount, Lord Furness, for his supporting statements.
On Question, Bill read 2a, and committed to a Committee of the Whole House.

ART AND DESIGN COURSES
2.29 p.m.
LORD BEAUMONT OF WHITLEY rose to ask Her Majesty's Government: What is their attitude to the recommendations of the National Council for Diplomas in Art and Design on conditions of entry to Dip. A.D. courses; and whether they will review present policy towards art education. The noble Lord said: My Lords, in rising to ask this Question it is my very pleasant duty to welcome the noble Lord Sandford, for the first performance of his duties in his new Department, and to say that we hope we may continue the same extremely useful working relationship we had with his predecessor. I am sorry that we have had to express this greeting, first of all, by roughing him up slightly during Question Time, and secondly by landing him now with what he must have realised is about the hottest potato in the larder of his Department.
This Question is by way of being a composite one. The noble Lord, Lord Strabolgi also had a Question down on this matter and we have amalgamated our two Questions, partly in order to save your Lordships' time and partly so that we can review the various problems in which we are interested in their full context. The merger of the art schools with the polytechnics, the death of the National Advisory Council on Art Education, the recommendations of the Pooling Committee on staff/student ratios and their implementation as already seen in Kent and the entry qualifications for the Diploma in Art and Design are all part of one picture.

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If it can be argued that they are not, nevertheless it is certainly true that they are seen by the great majority of people in the art world as part of one picture. Individually misplaced as many of us think the developments in each of these cases may be, they are together seen as part of a process of standardisation and bureaucratisation which has rightly roused the whole art and art education community into what is really an unparalleled ferment. It is for that reason that one makes no apology for raising this matter on a Friday in possibly a rather thin House. The audience to this debate will be extremely large and the words spoken here by the Government, when they reach the outside world after our present difficulties, will be very carefully read by a large number of people.
In asking this Question I propose to concentrate almost entirely on the entry qualifications for Dip. A.D. courses. I understand that the noble Lord, Lord Strabolgi, intends to deal rather more fully with some of the other points. I pick this key point of entry qualifications because it is part not only of the wider picture of changes in art education but also of the wider picture of the use of qualifications for entry to further and higher education. The question was asked by a leader in The Times on May 25 as to whether the interests of higher education are best served by an ever-greater reliance on certificates of proficiency in certain fields at the age of 18. This is a question which I myself would answer with a very firm "No".
We should ask ourselves to-day whether we are right to put the emphasis so much on those who will achieve qualifications, degrees or whatever, or whether the emphasis should be shifted a little as North-East London Polytechnic has been shifting it, as the Open University shifts it a bit, in favour of those who will most benefit from learning and from courses. That is a matter for a wider argument than we can have to-day and I do not base any part of the case that I am now putting on it. What seems to me unarguable is that we rely far too much on bits of paper as passports from one stage of education to another and from one part of life to another. These bits of paper are often, as in this case, highly irrelevant to the situation.
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It is inevitable, although it is sad, that in the university sphere the enormous number of would-be entrants make a rough and ready guide like two "A" levels an administrative necessity. But it is important that people should realise that this is what it is—merely an administrative necessity—and that "A" levels are very faulty predictive tools. It will be a tragedy if the pressures of a status-hungry National Union of Teachers manage to enforce the same standards on the Dip. H.E., thus closing the entrance to this extremely interesting experiment to 87½ per cent. of the school-leaving population, a higher percentage in the North and, incidentally, a higher percentage of girls.
When we reach the Dip. A.D. we are moving from the tragic to the absurd. If "A" levels have minor claims to predictive virtues at university level, they have none in the fine and applied arts. Indeed, according to some figures that I have from Kingston Polytechnic they appear to be negatively predictive in the field of fashion and possibly in the fields of furniture design and sculpture. They appear to be not only irrelevant but actually negatively predictive.
The noble Lord, Lord Sandford will know the figures which the Department has already given me and for which I am grateful, considering qualifications obtained and jobs obtained by students leaving art colleges, broken down by the number of "O" levels and "A" levels which students had at entry to those art colleges. He will know that there is little significant difference between those with no "O" levels and those with two "A" levels. I hope he also knows—because I know a copy of the letter containing this information was sent to the Department last month—that a further breakdown shows that there was not just little significant difference but that there was actually no significant difference on the spectrum from those having three "O" levels to those having three "A" levels. There is a slight difference below three "O" levels, but from three "O" levels on there is no difference. Far from a need for two "A" levels as a standard of entry, the concept of five "O" levels is wide open to attack.
The Minister will tell us that the procedure allows for many exceptions for

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those who do not have these qualifications but who are shown to have talent. Of course it does. It would have to do this. It is not an exaggeration to say that if it did not there would be mass walkouts of staff and students from almost every art college in the country. But the point is not whether there are exceptions; the point is what is the rule and whether there should be a rule. To start with, the faculty for making exceptions tends to get eroded. What we see now is a tidying-up process. When there is a tidying-up process which has built into it a lot of exceptions there is always a tendency for people to try to do away with the exceptions because they are untidy. Let us stop this before it gets started, because there is no justifiable reason for the rule at all. The only justification is that of tidiness. If there is any justification for a change it would be the lowering of the "O" level standards rather than the other way round.
I have no time, my Lords, to deal with what many regard as the worst feature of the recommendations, which is the foreseen erosion of foundation courses. Suffice it to say that it is quite unrealistic to think that Sixth Forms will be able to find the resources to provide anything remotely equalling the foundation courses. It is probably wrong to think that they should if they could, because it is arguable that this would be a misuse of resources when the foundation courses themselves offer such a good alternative. As one head of a department in a polytechnic said to me, the ill effects of keeping highly motivated young people in school for two extra years doing more or less irrelevant courses and taking more or less irrelevant exams is good for them neither as artists nor as people.
I ask the Government what attitude they take to these proposals. I freely concede that they did not dream up this blunderland themselves, but in the first place, if alterations are needed to the regulations for grants—and these tend to be both stick and carrot—it is the Secretary of State who will have to act or to refuse to act. In the second place, we know perfectly well that a few well-chosen words by the Secretary of State would puff this whole fabrication away. These are matters on which the Gov-
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ernment should have views, and should express them.
My Lords, I have concentrated on one particular point, but I still see it in the larger context. In closing, I should like to quote some words of my noble friend, Lord Esher, Rector of the Royal College of Art, in a recent lecture to the Royal Society of Arts. He said:
"Among other things which are not expendable is our system of art and design education. It needs enriching, not scrapping. That is why I and others view with some alarm a tendency in Whitehall—or rather York Road —to suppose that it can properly be run from there. In this country the professions, for example, law and medicine and architecture, have always accepted and jealously guarded the responsibility of seeing that their training meets society's needs, and the links between practice and education have been extremely close.
"In art and design the guidance of a unified professional body does not exist, and the Government of the day very properly set up the National Advisory Council on Art Education to fill the gap. It was, no doubt, a highly diverse and divisible body, and the temptation for its masters to divide and rule has proved irresistible.
"The world of art and design is united in its conviction that the Government were wrong to close down the Advisory Council, and that without such an authoritative advisory body there is no hope of this country maintaining its present leadership in art and design education. We can already see the decline setting in with the lopping of art schools within the polytechnics and the savage cuts about to be meted out to their staffs.
"It is almost unbelievable that this should be done at the moment when we enter the European community, in which everybody recognises that we have the best art and design education in the world. This country does not have so many excellencies these days that it can afford to throw away the few it has."
In quoting those wise words of my noble friend, I beg leave to ask the Question standing in my name on the Order Paper.
2.43 p.m.
LORD STRABOLGI: My Lords, I am sure that we are grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Beaumont of Whitley, for raising this matter. I should like to congratulate him most warmly, if I may, on his moving, sincere, and knowledgeable speech. The noble Lord was kind enough to allow me to add my Question to his. It has been a marriage of the two, and I am grateful to him. Of course, as the noble Lord has said, some aspects of current policy have been causing great concern. It is surely right that the Government should be asked to state their

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attitude towards them. As the noble Lord, Lord Beaumont, indicated, I intend to deal with some other related aspects in this field. Before doing so, however, I should like to congratulate the noble Lord, Lord Sandford, who is to reply, on his transfer to the Department of Education and Science. We know the noble Lord from his work as Under-Secretary of State in the Department of the Environment, and we know from this that his heart is in the right place. Therefore we hope that the case which will be put before him will be considered sympathetically.
These higher entry qualifications which have been proposed seem to have been the direct result of the merger next year between the National Council for Diplomas in Art and Design and the Council for National Academic Awards. The Coldstream Report, 1960, recommended five passes at "O" level plus a foundation course. These entry requirements with, of course, the panel of selection, seem to have been working well. What is the reason for the proposed change? Also, how many potential artists are going to be lost through it? How can artistic talent possibly be measured academically? Artistic talent is something with which a person is born; it does not mean that that same person is always good at passing exams. The proposal will make it more difficult for art students to obtain grants, since mandatory awards are given to students because they have the required entry qualifications, not necessarily because they are admitted to advanced courses. In 1972–73 about half the students entering art diploma courses did not have two or more "A" levels. In future, these will presumably merit only discretionary awards—if they are lucky.
This proposal will also be socially divisive, like so much of the Government's policy. Nature scatters her artistic gifts irrespective of social status. Until now, art schools—and I speak from personal experience as a former art student—have been completely democratic, with students coming from all sorts of backgrounds, and united in their enthusiasm for art. However, in future the academic barriers will discriminate against early school-leavers from the lower income groups. In 1971, only
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about 36 per cent. of secondary school children continued after 16 years of age, and only 12·5 per cent. of school-leavers in the year 1969 to 1970 had two "A" levels. I admit that this is expected to rise, and it is hoped that by 1985, about 22 per cent. will leave school with at least one "A" level. But this will still be less than one-quarter of all school-leavers. I find it extremely difficult to believe that these are the only ones endowed with artistic talent.
The proposed requirement for two "A" levels is strongly opposed also by ILEA. The Authority is worried that the requirement will mean the end of the foundation course, to which the noble Lord, Lord Beaumont of Whitley, referred. I agree entirely with the noble Lord, and I doubt if sixth form activity can possibly be a substitute for a foundation course, except perhaps in one or two large and advanced schools. The foundation course is basically a higher education activity. It is important also that such a course is based on the unique and inspiring atmosphere of an art school, as it enables the student, with his teachers, to discover his special interests and aptitudes. In general, a good foundation course is a far better preparation for a diploma than "A" levels could ever be.
Many people in the art teaching world are concerned also that the Pooling Committee has laid down that staff/student ratios should be about half what they are at present. The proposal takes no account of the special requirements of art schools. These really cannot be compared with universities, and classed with other academic disciplines. Fine art and design is more individual; long periods are spent on it. Studios and workshops are in use for long periods in a week. Much more staff supervision is required, not only because of the variety of the work, but also because arts and crafts students often use potentially dangerous machinery and equipment.
I gather that the ratio is calculated on a student working week of 18 hours, but all art colleges work a 30 to 40 hour week. Concern about this proposal, and the insensitive lumping together of all disciplines, irrespective of what work is entailed, has most understandably been expressed by the N.C.D.A.D., and also

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the working party set up by the Conference of Heads of Education in Art and Design. Already some education authorities, such as Kent, have decided to implement the proposals, and Maidstone College of Art intends to cut down on staff. I believe also that art teaching staff are being reduced at the Brighton Polytechnic. The Principal of Chelsea School of Art—my own old art school—tells me that they would lose just under half their teaching staff but that, fortunately, they are safe as the school comes under ILEA. The first to be made redundant will be the part-time teachers, as most full-time staff are on long-term contracts.
I do not think that the Government or the Pooling Committee can have any idea of the importance of the part-time teacher. Students prefer to be taught by practising artists, and they usually make the best teachers. I can vouch for this from my own experience at Chelsea, where I had the good fortune to be taught by both Henry Moore and Graham Sutherland, among others. A further fact is that part-time teaching helps to provide a livelihood for artists, particularly at the earlier stages of their career.
These are ill-judged proposals, resulting, presumably, from a wish for administrative convenience at all costs and from the evident intention to cut down on art education. They seem to have been put forward by people who have little experience of art education. Indeed, one wonders if some of them have ever been inside an art school. It is a great pity that the Government have dissolved the National Advisory Council in Art Education, and I agree with everything that the noble Lord, Lord Beaumont of Whitley, said on this point. The Council was composed largely of artists and designers and gave experienced advice at a high level. Now that the Government are busy reconstituting some of the other useful bodies which they so impetuously dissolved on first coming into office, perhaps they will reconstitute the Art Education Council. They could call it by another name, if they preferred to do so and if it would make it easier for them.
I regret also that the proposed amalgamation of the N.C.D.A.D., which deals with art schools and colleges, with the C.N.A.A.A., which deals with Poly-
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technics, will mean the loss of an independent body for assessing art and design study. This is all the more important at present when it is the policy to absorb art colleges into polytechnics, where they will be dependent on the latter for finance and will also be subject to their course-planning requirements. I think it a matter for regret that no polytechnic director has an art and design background. This is a great disadvantage, which I hope will be rectified in future.
It is a mistake to think that art and design have only a minor role in this technological age. In the last few decades, Britain has produced artists and designers who are second to none in the world. They are the products of a sensible system of art education which is the envy of many other countries. If we tamper with it, we shall stifle the artists of the future, to our national detriment.
2.55 p.m.
THE PARLIAMENTARY UNDERSECRETARY OF STATE, DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION AND SCIENCE (LORD SANDFORD): My Lords, I am grateful to both noble Lords for their kind remarks, and particularly to my brother in Holy Orders on the Liberal Benches for arranging my Friday baptism. If one is to be baptised into the Department of Education and Science, I suppose that the two hot potatoes of student grants and art colleges are as good as any other medium with which to start. I am grateful to my two noble friends beside and behind me for remaining in my support.
In answer to the first part of the Question of the noble Lord, I should like to say that my right honourable friend is grateful to the National Council for Diplomas in Arts and Design for responding to the invitation which she sent them in April, 1972, to consider the conditions of entry to courses for diplomas in art and design, the field for which it is responsible, and to do so in the light of the Coldstream Report of 1970 (not 1960, as I think the noble Lord, Lord Strabolgi said), and her own Circular of 1971, No. 7/71.
The National Council, as both noble Lords will know, is an autonomous body carrying full responsibility on its own shoulders for its own decisions in this field and not subject to any directions from

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my right honourable friend. I think that both noble Lords will have seen the memorandum containing its recommendations and there is no need for me to go through much of it verbatim. However, I will go through the significant part—paragraph 4—to some extent, to remind the House that among the things it said was that, with effect from
"such date as as the Council shall determine"—
and that date is not before September, 1976, so we are not talking about anything precipitate—
"the nomal minimum—"
not the invariable—
"educational requirement for entry to three-year and four-year sandwich courses leading to Diploma in Art and Design shall be one of the following three: the General Certificate of Education with passes in five subjects, including two subjects at Advanced Level, equivalent qualifications listed in the Award Regulations and such other appropriate equivalent qualifications as the Council, with the agreement of the Secretary of State, may in due course determine."
I want to make the point straight away that we are not dealing with something which is on top of us now, nor are we dealing with a single qualification for entry. It will be seen from what I have said and from other parts of the memorandum that the National Council does intend that there should be alternative acceptable entry qualifications. In the first place, there are the commonly recognised equivalents to two "A" Levels which my right honourable friend already specifies in her Award Regulations as qualifying, eligible students on first degree courses, courses which she designates as comparable. I do not think that we need go into those in any great detail.
In addition to those provisions, the Council added the rider that it would wish to preserve the right to provide for exemption from the proposed entry requirements, so that still remains. This is a right which it is prepared to exercise at present in the case of students of exceptional talent who have not obtained the existing minimum requirement of five "O" Levels. One would not want them to be debarred for that reason. Thus, I think that it would be wrong to think that the Council wishes to narrow the
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future entry to a strict two-"A" Level qualification. There is nothing in its memorandum which leads to that conclusion. However, it does have it in mind as a measure of the normal future standard —and this is clearly a different and higher standard than that which has existed up to now of five "O" Levels coupled with completion of a foundation course—a higher standard.
I would stress three other points: first, the date of the change. The memorandum says that the Council considers that it would be inappropriate to require before September, 1976, the new conditions of students entering Dip. A.D. courses, so that, as I say, nothing precipitate is proposed. Secondly, there is the position of the foundation courses, which both noble Lords mentioned. While the council is proposing these changes in requirements it expresses the view in its memorandum that, until alternative provision elsewhere has considerably improved—I think that this meets the point that the noble Lord made, that there is room for improvement, and it may not be possible in every case to make the improvements easily—foundation courses are likely to remain for many students a necessary preparation.
Thirdly, there are the possible other equivalent qualifications for entry. The Council says that it hopes to be able to specify these, but it has not yet done so. The Council has indicated that it will wish to formulate these in agreement with my right honourable friend, and she, for her part, I know, will be glad to respond. It is clearly desirable because, as both noble Lords have recognised, if the National Council wishes to introduce alternative entry requirements not among those prescribed in my right honourable friend's Award Regulations, action as well as agreement on her part will be necessary if students possessing these qualifications only are to be eligible for mandatory, as distinct from a discretionary, award of grant. She will therefore have to consider and to consult with the local authority associations about such proposals for alternative entry qualifications, such as the National Council may put before her. But, until it has put them before her, I cannot say what her attitude to them will be.

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I would end my reply to this part of the Question by making the point to the noble Lord, Lord Beaumont, that it is not so much for my right honourable friend as for the National Council for Diplomas in Art and Design to state its views as to what should be the entry requirements for courses leading to diplomas for which they are responsible. My right honourable friend has asked the Council to make such recommendations, and it has done so in the memorandum to which his Question refers.
I turn now to the other part of the Question, which I think comes from the noble Lord, Lord Strabolgi. The short answer to him is that a major review has been, and is still being, undertaken. The Coldstream Report, to which he refers, of 1970, was the first fruits of it. My right honourable friend's first response to that was Circular 7/71, with which he will be familiar. Among the other things which we have already discussed, and several other things which the Coldstream Report suggested, was that there should be a central body responsible for reviewing and planning a national pattern of so-called design technician courses. I do not think that either of the noble Lords mentioned that, but my right honourable friend decided to establish a working group to review the pattern of courses in this area, and my right honourable friend hopes shortly to receive the working group's report upon it. That will give her a basis to carry further forward her consideration of matters relating to vocational courses.
Both noble Lords have anxieties about the Pooling Committee. The memorandum from that body contained recommendations for student/staff ratios in advanced further education. It was produced by the committee of local authority representatives, for which the Department of Education and Science provides the chairman and the servicing.
The main point I want to make in answer to the noble Lord's anxiety is that this memorandum had a special word to say about art colleges, and recognised their special character and position. The attainment of the ratios it was talking about in general within the recommended band could put particular strains on some
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of the art colleges whose present student/staff ratios are, for various reasons, a good deal more generous than the average. Therefore, it recommended that authorities should consider sympathetically the present circumstances of art and design and the special difficulties that some colleges might face in moving into the appropriate ratio band. My right honourable friend and I support this approach and hope very much that authorities will heed the advice about art colleges, and particularly will note what the noble Lord, Lord Strabolgi, said about part-time teachers.
Both noble Lords commented on the position of the National Advisory Council on Art Education. I cannot yet go far beyond what my right honourable friend said in answer to a Written Question in another place about 18 months ago. She said that it was not her intention to reconstitute the National Advisory Council immediately but to consider, as future needs arise, how best to draw on opinion and guidance in this sector of further education, but she will continue to keep the matter under review while the implications of its last major Report, and the subsequent conclusions on it, are still being worked out, as they are at the moment.
Both noble Lords referred to the proposed merger between the N.C.D.A.D. and the C.N.A.A. The proposal for the merger comes from the two Councils themselves. In February of this year they issued jointly a statement saying that they had decided in principle that they wished to amalgamate, following discussions between them since their respective decisions in February, 1972, to explore the possibility of a merger. The statement expresses the conviction of the Councils that an amalgamation on a basis mutually acceptable to each of them would enrich higher education and yield substantial benefits for many colleges and students. It sets out several matters of substance on which the Councils have already agreed and with which I think noble Lords will be familiar.
The statement speaks of a proposed merger in September, 1974. Here, again, there is time for further consideration. In any case, before the merger could occur there would be various processes to go through. Changes in the Charter of the C.N.A.A. would require the

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approval of Her Majesty's Privy Council. Amendments to the Statutes would need to be approved by my right honourable friend. A scheme for the N.C.D.A.D. would need to be made under the Charities Act. In fact, the arrangements for any amalgamation will not be possible without Government agreement, as the joint statement makes clear.
The last questions that I still have to cover, to answer the two noble Lords opposite, deal with art colleges and polytechnics. I am advised that the present position is that, of the forty centres in England originally approved to offer courses leading to the Dip. A.D., seventeen are now in polytechnics. The remaining twenty-three are outside, as are some forty other local authority art schools and colleges, which mostly do non-advanced work. Recently, two further centres have been approved by both my right honourable friend and the N.C.D.A.D. to offer Dip. A.D. courses from September of this year. One is a polytechnic at Teesside and the other a proposed polytechnic at Preston. There are no current proposals originated in or received by the Department of Education and Science to bring any more art colleges within the polytechnic system.
Where art colleges have been incorporated into polytechnics in some cases there may have been initial problems arising from the need to adapt to a new situation—teething troubles—but there is no good reason to believe that the polytechnics which have them will not derive growing benefit from their art departments. Students in the art departments
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will find, we believe, that the polytechnics offer all kinds of potential for wider opportunities of study. Thus, both through what the art and design work can give by its influence on other areas of the polytechnics' activities and through the advantages that can be expected to some aspects of art and design study from a closer association with other disciplines. I believe that these mergers can fairly be seen as full of considerable promise from both points of view. Nevertheless, an important place remains for the separate art college, a category still accounting for more than half of the approved diploma centres to date. Circular 7/71 made it clear that in the context of eligibility to submit new Dip. A.D. course proposals there would be no differentiation between existing Dip. A.D. centres, whether in polytechnics or not.
My Lords, to sum up this brief debate. My right honourable friend and I are glad that the National Council has been able to formulate up-to-date conditions of entry to the courses for diplomas for which it is responsible. My right honourable friend looks forward to participating in the consideration of whatever further alternative qualifications the Council put forward to her, as it has indicated it will do. As to the second part of the Question, I confirm that the review initiated by the Coldstream Committee is being carried forward, particularly in those aspects and in those ways to which Circular 7/71 referred. We look forward in particular to receiving quite soon the report of the working party on Vocation Courses.
House adjourned at twelve minutes past three o'clock.